
Class 
Book 



BS 



Copyright N° 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



HISTORICAL EVIDENCE 

OF THE 

NEW TESTAMENT. 

AN INDUCTIVE STUDY IN CHRISTIAN EVIDENCES. 



The Facts Mentioned in the New Testament Demonstrated to be 

Historical by the Worst Enemies op Christianity who Lived 

in the First Three Centuries op our Era, CONFIRMED by 

as many Christian Writers op Fame, Contemporaries who 

Wrote in Different Countries and Periods : the whole 

RECONFIRMED by many Remarkable Evidences 

Recently Discovered: Ancient Documents, 

Monuments, Arches, Inscriptions, Coins, 

Superscriptions, and 

CHRISTIAN ART. 



EiSores qtl ets airoXoyiav rov evayyeXcov kci/acu. 

" I am set for the Defense of the Gospel." — To the Philippians. 

"For we have not any power against the Truth, but in behalf of the Truth." 

— To the Corinthians. 

BY 

REV. S. L. BOWMAN A.M., 8. 3.VD ;! ; 



CINCINNATI: JENNINGS AND PYE. 
NEW YORK: EATON AND MAINS. 



\ 






LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

DEC 30 1903 

CLASS & XXc. No, 
COPY 3 



Copyright, 1903, by 
Jennings and Pyb. 






Va TOg «Kfc 



PREFACE, 



This treatise is a contribution to the Christian Evidences 
demanded by the times. It is dedicated to the intelligent 
young men of the period. The work is designed to meet the 
skeptical issues of the day which deny the historical character 
of Christianity during the first three centuries, holding that 
the claim is not absolutely based upon the facts of Christ's life 
as is narrated in the four Gospels. No other work known to 
the writer has proposed to traverse this territory upon the 
lines and in the form here adopted. It embraces the period 
between the crucifixion of Christ and the time when Constan- 
tine the Great established Christianity throughout the Eoman 
Empire as the religion of the State in A. D. 325. After this 
date there is no question made touching the historicity of 
Christianity. 

Paley's Evidences nobly met the requirements of his age ; 
but new issues have risen since which call for a restatement 
of the Christian argument in a more comprehensive form, for- 
tified by the monumental evidences of recent discovery. As 
Dr. Philip Schaff judiciously remarks: "Lardner, Doddridge, 
and Leland made good use of Celsus against the Deists of 
their day. He may with still greater effect be turned against 
Strauss and Renan" {Person of Christ, p. 101, note.) Mr. 
George Eawlinson also observes: "It is important to bear in 
mind the fact that there is no period in the whole range of 
ancient history whereof we possess a more full and exact knowl- 
edge than we do of the first century of our era? (Truth of the 
Scripture Records, Amer. ed. 383, Note 3. 



Preface. 



The method of procedure is to employ the testimonies of 
the adversaries of Christianity who lived in the first centuries 
of our era indicated, to confirm the statements of the apostolic 
writers, and prove the historicity of the facts related in the 
sacred narratives. The writers hostile to the Christian re- 
ligion are of two classes, — Jewish and heathen. Of the Jews 
the testimony adduced is that taken from the works of Jo- 
sephus, the Talmud, the Toledoth Jeshu {History of Jesus), 
and a few others, such as the recent History of the Jews by 
Dr. Heinrich Graetz, a professor in the University of Breslau, 
Prussia ; of the heathen, the testimony of Tacitus, Pliny, Sue- 
tonius, Lucian, Celsus, Porphyry, and the Emperor Julian as 
the connecting link between the primitive and the later Chris- 
tianity acknowledged to be historical. The testimony of the 
Friends of Christianity, who were the contemporaries of the 
Adversaries, is that of the Apostolic Fathers, the Christian 
Apologists, and the first four Pauline Epistles, which are now 
acknowledged, by all living skeptics of character, to be au- 
thentic and credible. The testimony of the Christian writers 
is emplo}^ed to confirm the testimony of their enemies respect- 
ing the facts alleged in the historical part of the New Testa- 
ment. Then this mass of testimony is reconfirmed by the 
new "finds" — the Documents, Monuments, Arches, Inscrip- 
tions, Coins, Superscriptions, and Christian Art. 

Respecting the value of monumental evidence, Dr. Philip 
Schaff remarks : 

"The importance of these literary discoveries and investigations 
should not blind us to the almost equally important monumental dis- 
coveries and researches of Cavalier de Rossi, Garrucci, and other Italian 
scholars who have illuminated the subterranean mysteries of the Church 
of Rome and of early Christian art. Neander, Gieseler, and Baur, the 
greatest Church historians of the nineteenth century, are as silent about 
the catacombs as Mosheim and Gibbon were in the eighteenth. But 



PREFACE. 



who could now write a history of the first three centuries without re- 
cording the lessons of those rude yet expressive pictures, sculptures and 
epitaphs from the homes of confessors and martyrs? Nor should we 
overlook the gain which has come to us from the study of monumental 
inscriptions, as, for instance, in rectifying the date of Poly carp's mar- 
tyrdom, who is brought ten years nearer the age of St. John." (Hist, of 
Christian Church, Vol. II; Preface, p. vii.) 

Where new witnesses are introduced, there will be found 
before each chapter an epitome of the life and works of those 
testifying. The object of this is to furnish the young reader 
some knowledge of the character of the attesting party, as a 
proper preparation to appreciate the value of his testimony. 
Acknowledgment is specially due for the use made of Dr. Na- 
thaniel Lardner's great work consisting of ten volumes : a the- 
saurus of learning and apologetic literature. As he has usually 
furnished his citations in the language in which they were 
originally written, in some instances this author has made his 
own translations therefrom; but in all cases where critical 
care and consideration were regarded as specially due, the 
rendering found place in the text of the page, that the English 
reader might experience no break in the continuity of thought; 
and the original of the citation was placed in the foot-note 
with proper reference, which the scholarly reader would most 
desire to see. 

An Appendix may be found at the end of this volume con- 
taining valuable matter which could not well be placed in the 
body of the work. Attention is specially directed to Jose- 
phus's Testimony of Christ for the reason that all the principal 
arguments pro and con are there adduced respecting the gen- 
uineness of this famous paragraph. The reader is to determine 
for himself whether the testimony is of evidential value in the 
course of this discussion. Pliny's Official Letter to the Em- 
peror Trajan is there given in full. The Logia of our Lord in 



6 Preface. 



Greek and its translation; The Didache, or Teaching of the 
Twelve Apostles, and the celebrated Muratorian Canon are 
there noted and described. In an Excursus is given the Jews' 
authoritative Edict for expurgating all references to Jesus 
Christ, with particular reference to opprobrious language ap- 
plied to him in their Talmud. Tabular Exhibits are super- 
added for reference. 

That this volume may prove to be a blessing of helpfulness 
to the faith of the rising young men of the country, who may 
have perplexities of doubt respecting the historicity of the 
New Testament Scriptures, and consequently of the primitive 
Christianity, is the sincere and devout wish of the 

AUTHOR. 

New Yoek, 1903. 



CONTENTS. 



Chapter Page 

Introduction, __.._. v ii 

I. General Anticipations op the Coming Messiah, - - 19 

II. The Nativity op the Lord Jesus Christ, 41 

III. Circumstances Concurrent with His Nativity, - 63 

IV. Unique Place op John the Baptist in History, - 91 
V. The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity, - 113 

VI. The Proof op Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ, - 139 

VII. Characteristics and Value op Christ's Miracles, - 161 

VIII. Modern Objections to the Miracles op Christ, - 181 

IX. The Passion, the Death, and the Burial op Jesus, - 211 

X. The Resurrection op Jesus Christ prom the Dead, - 233 

XI. The Ascension of the Lord Jesus into Heaven, - - 295 

XII. The Apostles of Jesus Christ and their Work, - 313 

XIII. The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians, - - 343 

XIV. Unique History of Palestine for Fifty Years, - 385 
XV. The Roman Rulers of the Jews, and the New Testament, 413 

XVI. The House of the Herods, and the New Testament, - 459 

XVII. Destruction of the Jewish Nation, and the New Testament, 501 

XVIII. Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World, - 555 

XIX. Verification of the New Testament as Historical, - 585 

XX. Manuscripts, Versions, and Canon op the New Testament, 633 

APPENDIX. 

Excursus 

A. Testimony of Josephus Respecting Jesus Christ, - - 665 

B. Pliny's State Paper Addressed to Emperor Trajan, - 671 

C. The Logia op our Lord, or, " The Sayings of Jesus," - 673 

D. Didachb, or, "The Teaching op the Twelve Apostles," 674 

E. " The Muratorian Canon:" Description and Value, - 675 

F. The Talmud Expurgated op its References to Jesus, 676 

G. Extracts from the Jewish Work, " The Toledoth Jeshu," 678 

Exhibit 

A. Chronology of the Books of the New Testament, - 687 

B. High Priests and Procurators of Palestine, - - 689 

C. Comparative Table op the Critics Respecting Testimonies, 690 

D. Table op Contemporary Witnesses and Documents, - 691 

E. Chronological Table op all Witnesses Cited in this Work, 693 
Index, --______> 695 

7 



O that mine enemy would write a book. ... I would bind it to me 
as a crown. — Job. 

For their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being 

judges. — Moses. 

Fas est ab hoste doceri: "It is right to be taught by an enemy." — Ro- 
man Motto. 

"Eroi/uoi de del irpb? airokoyiav iravrl r<£ clItovvti v/ua? \6yov trepl t?)$" ip i>/uv i\irl8o^. 

But ready always for every one asking you a reason in respect to a de- 
fense concerning the hope in you. — Peter. 

For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness ? And 
what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord 
hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath he that believeth 
with an infidel ?— Paul. 

8 



INTRODUCTION. 



THE CONSPECTUS. 

§ 1. The Proposition. A Scheme of Evidence is to be 
introduced embracing hundreds of circumstances recorded in 
the historical New Testament related to the origin, antiquity, 
and authenticity of those Scriptures. Among others, will be 
embraced those capital facts and truths upon which Chris- 
tianity was founded, and upon which it has ever securely re- 
posed. The argument based upon these occurrences will be 
conducted informally upon the Inductive rather than the De- 
ductive principle, proceeding from the facts rather than from 
propositions to the conclusions. 

§ 2. Plan of the Work. The arrangement following will 
sufficiently indicate the character and scope of the investiga- 
tion proposed in this treatise : 

I. The Gospel and the Christ of History. 
II. The Gospel and the Work of Christ. 

III. The Gospel and the Public of Palestine. 

IV. The Gospel and the Roman Rulers. 
V. The Gospel and the Jewish Rulers. 

VI. The Gospel and the Jewish Nation. 
VII. The Gospel and the Gentile World. 
§ 3. Witness of Enemies. Those occurrences referred to as 
basal to the Christian religion are to be substantiated upon 
the testimony of twenty ancient Adversaries of Christianity 
who were Roman, Greek, and Jewish writers of antiquity and 
eminence. They were the contemporaries of the apostles and 
their successors, all of whom were very unfriendly, and most 
of whom were the worst enemies that Christianity ever had. 
Their testimony is preferred because of their known hostility 



10 Introduction. 



to the Christian cause, which gives an added value to their 
witness. Of these twenty adversaries, nineteen lived within 
the first three centuries after the crucifixion of Christ, ten of 
whom were the contemporaries of the apostles and of the 
events recorded in the several Gospels; frve or six were the 
contemporaries of the Apostolic Fathers, the pupils and im- 
mediate successors of the apostles ; and the remaining three 
were the contemporaries of the Christian Apologists living at 
a remove of one or two generations later. The twentieth wit- 
ness reigned on the imperial throne of Rome, and wrote not 
long after Constantine the Great had established Christianity 
as the religion of the State throughout the Roman Empire. 
His testimony may be regarded as furnishing a connecting 
link in the history of the sub- Apostolic Christianity, and that 
which has existed ever since. After the adoption of the 
Christian religion in the Roman world, there is no question 
entertained touching its historicity. 

It is to be noted, however, that these twenty adversaries 
who attest the truth of the sacred record, do not all testify to 
each one of the hundreds of facts to be adduced. For one 
may make reference to one fact, and another may mention 
several facts ; while a third may confirm the first two testi- 
monies, and perhaps give additional details. But the several 
testimonies are to be taken together to prove, beyond a ra- 
tional doubt, the historical antiquity and authenticity of the 
record claimed; furnishing a broad basis for the induction 
that the entire content of the New Testament respecting the 
founding and diffusion of the Christian religion is both ancient 
and true. 

Now, the negative contention of ancient infidels really 
makes for the Christian cause. Even their denial at the times 
they severally lived is a tacit admission that there had pre- 
viously existed an account regarded by others as historical re- 
lated to cardinal Christian facts. For why should any man 
deny that which no one had ever affirmed ? Or why should 



Introduction. 1 1 



books be written to refute what nobody had asserted? Or 
why should men have been persecuted and martyred for their 
faith, if there existed absolutely no ground for their believing? 
If the religion of the Christians was founded on nothing more 
substantial than an innocent fancy, what reason is to be as- 
signed that an opposition arose so fierce that it put men to 
death? If we run backward through the earlier centuries of 
our era, we shall find in each generation that there existed an 
account of the occurrence of facts which were the ground of 
the faith that then existed, an account which antedated the 
opposition and its generation, until we reach the Founder of 
Christianity himself, by whom, and in respect to whom, came 
those occurrences which have inspired the world. 

Furthermore, it is not the function of historical evidence 
to compel belief. It is not required that any question shall be 
placed beyond the ability of an unreasonable man to doubt ; 
for whoever is determined to disbelieve can do so, whatever 
just grounds exist for conviction. But the mental attitude of 
such a disputant is that of self -stultification. It satisfies all 
legitimate demands in reasoning that evidence of such char- 
acter be adduced as commands that high degree of probability 
which renders a belief in the contrary conclusion irrational. 
In short, as reasoning men we have no right to believe with- 
out reason, and we have no right to disbelieve when we have 
the reason. Mere prejudice is not reasoning or reasonable. 
"He that judgeth before he heareth is not wise." Mere 
opinion is not evidence, and can not be substituted for evi- 
dence. A denial based upon ignorance of facts at issue can 
never be taken as disproof of the facts affirmed to be unhistor- 
ical. Rather all mere assertions and assumptions leave ab- 
solutely untouched the historicity of questions under con- 
sideration. 

§ 4. Witness of Friends. The testimony of the friends of 
Christianity is reserved to confirm the testimony of its enemies. 
The two classes were contemporaries. This corroborative 



1 2 Introduction. 



testimony will be drawn from three sources of the Christian 
writers, viz.: 

a) The Apostolic Fathers, who were the personal Disciples 
of the Apostles; 

ft) The Christian Apologists, or Defenders of the Faith, 
who wrote later ; and 

y) The first four Pauline Epistles, now universally con- 
ceded to be authentic and credible. 

§5. Witness of Antiquities. This kind of testimony is 
that furnished by ancient Documents recently discovered, by 
Public Monuments, Arches, Coins, Inscriptions, Superscrip- 
tions, and by Christian Art. Archaeological testimony applies 
not to all Christian facts, but to many and sufficient. Wher- 
ever applicable, this sort of testimony will be adduced for the 
purpose of recorroboration of the foregoing testimonies. Its evi- 
dential value in history is very great and decisive, since it is 
impossible to conceive that such public affairs could be pub- 
licly imposed upon a given community and be groundless, or 
be done by fraud. 

§ 6. Witnesses Classified. Both adverse and friendly wit- 
nesses, as giving weight to their testimony, may here be 
classed according to their Rank and Profession among men. 



ADVERSABIES OF CHRISTIANITY. 

Physicians. One: Galen. 

Classic Writers. Three : Martial, Juvenal, and Vergil. 

Philosophers. Five: Seneca, Epictetus, Lucian, Celsus, and 

Porphyry. 
Historians. Five: Strabo, Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius, and 

Dion Cassius. 
Roman Proconsuls. Two : Pliny the Younger, and Hierocles. 
Roman Emperors. Four: Trajan, Hadrian, Aurelius, and 

Julian. 
Jewish Authors. Many : (1) of the Talmud; (2) of the Tole- 

doth Jeshu. 



Introduction. 13 



ADVOCATES OF CHRISTIANITY. 

Apostles of Jesus Christ, One : Paul. 

Apostolic Fathers. Four: Barnabas, Clement, Ignatius, and 
Polycarp. 

Other Patristic Witnesses. Two : Irenaeus a Bishop, and Clem- 
ent a Teacher, of Alexandria. 

Christian Apologists. Five: Quadratus, Melito, Tertullian, 
Apollonius, and Lactantius. 

Christian Philosophers. Four: Aristides, Justin Martyr, Ap- 
ollonius, and Origen. 

Christian Historians. Three : Hegesippus, Eusebius, and Lac- 
tantius. 

Roman Emperors. One : Constantine the Great. 

§ 7. Historical Evidence. The characteristics and method 
of procedure, in case of historical evidence, differ very ma- 
terially from those of an ordinary court of trial. At the bar 
of Criticism there are no living issues on matters of past 
centuries, no living parties in contention, and no living wit- 
nesses to command in proof. There is no open court to in- 
vestigate the facts in the case, and no direct and cross-exam- 
ination of those testifying to test the validity of given claims. 
However, when the evidence sought is documentary as in case 
of the Scriptures, critical consideration is necessitated respect- 
ing the authorship, the antiquity, the authenticity and credi- 
bility of the case. The genuineness or the spuriousness of the 
text, the usage of specific words at the date claimed as a time- 
test, the material on which the writing appears, and the mode 
of the writing itself then in vogue, are searchingly examined 
as against forgery and fraud, the custody of the writing as 
against interpolations, and the accordancy of the contents 
with current events known from contemporaneous history. 

Other sources of information are also open to careful and 
critical consideration, such as the testimony of contemporaries 
of the writer of the document, official correspondence of offi- 



14 Introduction. 



cers and rulers, official governmental records, the existence of 
public monuments commemorative of special occasions in- 
volved, historical inscriptions found in public places, coins 
bearing images and superscriptions, works of art illustrative of 
facts and customs then existent ; in short, appeal may be made 
to any archaeological proofs discovered relating to the case in 
hand. Finally the fairness and credibility of the historian 
himself in his interpretation of the facts involved and the re- 
liability of the data upon which he has depended, are matters 
for consideration. On such evidence and by such methods 
must historical investigation proceed. Of course, no historian 
is required to have been himself an eye-witness of the occur- 
rences which he is properly called upon to interpret and re- 
cord. It certainly is not his function necessarily to write as a 
witness. He writes legitimately and credibly when he esti- 
mates the evidential value of the facts which happened centu- 
ries before he was born. By no means does it render nuga- 
tory his statements of history that others than the historian 
were the original witnesses of the facts which it is his part to 
place upon the historic page. 

§ 8. Value of Added Witnesses. Bishop Butler in his cele- 
brated Analogy remarks: "Probable proofs, by being added, 
not only increase the evidence, but multiply it." Mr. George 
Rawlinson, in his Bampton Lectures (1859), says: "When, two 
independent writers witness to the same event, the probability of 
that event is increased ; not in arithmetical, but in geometrical 
ratio ; not by mere addition, but by multiplication."* 

That is, the ratio of the credibility to the discredibility is 
as 100 to 1. Let it be assumed as 10 to 1 that a given event 
occurred upon the testimony of one witness, and the second 
witness, of equal credibility, testifies to the same fact. Then 
the evidence furnished is not 20 to 1 upon the testimony of 
two witnesses, but 120 to 1. And if three witnesses of equal 
credibility be taken, the credibility will be to the discredibility 

*See Wentworth's College Algebra, page 268. 



Introduction. 15 



as 1,330 to 1, in the final chances. Accordingly, it is of para- 
mount importance that this principle be kept carefully in 
sight in the discussion which is to follow, that the true value 
of the evidence adduced may be duly appreciated in respect to 
the authenticity and credibility of the New Testament as pro- 
posed in this treatise. 

§ 9. Criteria of Testimony. In determining the eligibility 
of witnesses and the validity of their testimony in historical 
investigation, a just criterion is had in order to discriminate 
between the true and the false, or the questionable. A few 
authorities may be cited on judicial procedures, as well as on 
the credibility of historical treatises, touching the admissibility 
of different testimonies when they are variant, the proper dis- 
position of conflicting evidence, reports derived from original 
witnesses, and the proper custody of documents which have 
come down to us from ancient times. These may be reduced 
to four in number : 

a) Canon of Divergent Testimonies. 

1. Statements of substantial truth, with circumstantial variety in 
detail and expression. 

2. Testimony of the original witnesses, when it is confirmed by the 
testimony of enemies. 

3. The testimony given when contrary to the interests of the wit- 
nesses testifying. 

4. The original witnesses testifying possessing stainless characters. 

j8) Conflicting Testimonies Reconciled. Thomas Starkie 
says: 

"In case of a seeming conflict in the evidence, it is legitimate to 
reconcile the differences by the facts involved ; but if the data for com- 
posing the discrepancies supposed can not be found in the evidence 
itself, a rational hypothesis to explain the difficulty is admissible/' 
(Law of Evidence, 8th Amer. edition.) 

y) Reports of Original Witnesses. Sir George Cornwall 
Lewis says : 

"Accounts . . . derived directly or indirectly from original wit- 
nesses , . . may be considered as presumptively entitled to credit." 
(Credibility of Early Roman History, 1856.) 
2 



1 6 Introduction. 



$) Custody of Ancient Documents. Simon Greenleaf says : 

11 Documents found in a place in which, and under the care of per- 
sons with whom such papers might naturally and reasonably be ex- 
pected to be found, or in possession of persons having an interest in 
them, are precisely in the custody which gives authenticity to docu- 
ments found in it." 

After his citation of cases, he adds this note : 

11 The rule stated in the text is one of the grounds on which we in- 
sist on the genuineness of the books of the Holy Scriptures. They are 
found in the proper custody or place where they have been kept from 
time immemorial. They have been constantly referred to as the founda- 
tion of the faith by all the sects whose existence God in his wisdom has 
seen fit to permit; whose zealous vigilance would readily detect any 
attempt to falsify the text, and whose divergence of creeds would render 
any mutual combination morally impossible. The burden of proof is 
therefore on the objector, to impeach the genuineness of the books, not 
upon the Christian to establish it." {Law of Evidence, edition 1853, 
§142.) 

THE PROSPECTUS. 

Attention is now directed briefly to the territory to be 
raversed in this treatise. The political condition of the 
country occupied by the Jews, wherein all the events related 
in the Gospels are said to have occurred, will naturally be 
considered; the times and rulers of the land, the language 
and customs of the people ; their conditions under the imperial 
government, and the common anticipations of the Coming 
One who was known as the predicted Ruler of the world. 
But the main facts narrated in the historical part of the New 
Te stament, such as the Nativity of Christ, His Ministry and 
Miracles, His Life and Death, His Resurrection and Ascen- 
sion, together with hundreds of minute circumstances of in- 
cidental mention therein, will pass duly under review in 
critical inquiry. For it is the purpose of this investigation to 
demonstrate in a judicial spirit, the truth of the contents of 
these Scriptures whose teachings are held to be based abso- 
lutely upon the facts mentioned. 

If it shall be found that these Scriptural statements are 



Introduction. 17 



confirmed by those who were absolutely hostile to Chris- 
tianity, by those who sought to destroy the faith and even to 
destroy the Sacred Books themselves — the contemporaries of 
the Christian writers adduced — how can the book itself be 
false? What better proof can be given or demanded on any 
question whatever of the historical past ? For as Dr. Philip 
Schaff, the great historian of the Christian Church, justly re- 
marks : " There is no historical work of ancient times which 
carries on its face such a seal of truthfulness as these [four] 
Gospels." 



CHAPTER I. 

ANTICIPATIONS OF MESSIAH. 

I. Literature : Vergil, Jewish Talmud, Chaldaic Targums. 
II. The Golden Age and Expectations Entertained. 

III. Scriptural Eevelations Respecting Messiah. 

IV. The Jewish Talmud and the Incarnate Messiah. 
V. The Chaldaic Targums and the Expected Messiah. 

VI. Anticipations Entertained by Other Nations. 
VII. Testimony op Adversaries Misplacing the Advent. Vergil — 
Josephus — Suetonius — Tacitus — Celsus. 
VIII. Critical Considerations and Inductions: 
a) The Fact Predicted. 
/3) The Person Predicted. 
y) The Time Predicted. 
19 



HISTORICAL EVIDENCE OF THE 
NEW TESTAMENT. 



Chapter I. 
ANTICIPATIONS OF THE MESSIAH. 

§ 10. Sources: Biographical Epitome of Witness and Literature. 

1. Vergil was a Latin poet of fame, born B. 0. 70, and died B. C. 19. In 

early life he resided in Borne and Naples, Italy. He was of deli- 
cate constitution, both in body and mind, and was a man of very 
gentle character. Carefully educated, he developed a genius for 
writing poetry, accordant with the classic style and Roman stand- 
ard. Among the most famous of his literary productions which 
have come down to us, are two works designated E clog as, consist- 
ing of ten bucolics, written about B. C. 41-39. In Ecloge iv, he 
makes distinct reference to the return of " the Golden Age" as the 
common hope of the nations in his time, expressed in the antici- 
pated personal incarnation of "A Holy Progeny who descends from 
heaven" to men. 

2. The Talmud, in Jewish literature, a Code of traditions held in nearly 

the same valuation and veneration as their Hebrew Scriptures. 
The entire work embraces twelve large folio volumes. It has two 
principal parts : the Mishna, or the text, and the Gemara, or com- 
mentary of explanations. 

a) The Mishna, meaning " repetition " of the Law, is a work 
said to have been begun by Ezra and his successors upon their 
return from Babylon to Jerusalem. When they disappeared from 
the scene, the Sanhedrin assumed tribunal functions. After some 
centuries had passed, an immense mass of traditionary matter had 
accumulated, embracing many contradictory opinions and decis- 
ions ; whereupon academies arose at Jerusalem, which became 
famous for digesting and propagating this stock of traditions. 
Hillel the elder, a Babylonian by birth, was installed at Jeru- 
salem as Patriarch of Palestine, B. C. 32. He arranged the Mishna 
into six chief divisions, called Sedarim, meaning orders, viz.: (1) 
Seraim, "seeds" or "field products;" (2) Moed, "festivals;" 
(3) Nashim, "laws of women;" (4) Nesikim, "legal provisions;" 

21 



22 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

(5) Kodeshim, "sacred things;" (6) Toharoth, "distinguishing 
between the clean and unclean. 5 ' Each division was subdivided 
into Mesachtoth, or tracts, sixty-three in number. 

The Jews of the true faith study the Mishna with the most 
venerating care. It is claimed that its traditions and expositions 
were derived orally from Moses and were reduced in final form by 
the celebrated Kabbi Jehudah, or Judah " the holy," who received 
the code from the earlier Rabbis, and they from Simon the Just, 
the last survivor of Ezra's Great Synagogue ; that the Synagogue 
received the same from the Seventy Elders appointed by Moses, 
who received it from Joshua, who received it from Moses, who 
received it from God! It was written about B. C. 400-A. D. 200. 

/3) The Gemdra, " complement" in the sense of the authorita- 
tive interpretation of the Law. That is, the Pentateuch was the 
authoritative written Law, and, the Gemdra its commentary, furnishing 
a code of "completion" or "perfection" such as to render all 
further additions inadmissible ! As soon as the Mishna was reduced 
to writing and published, their chief Rabbis wrote commentaries 
upon the work. It therefore exhibits those traditions of the Phar- 
isees which Jesus denounced so severely as unauthorized. (Matt, 
xv, 1-9.) 

There were two great centers of Rabbis engaged in writing the 
Gemara, and two works produced. The older one was called the 
Jerusalem or the Palestinian Gemara, because composed by the 
Rabbis of that country, whose center was the city of Tiberias in 
the later centuries. It was in one large folio, and published 
towards the close of the fourth century. The other, called the 
Babylonian Gemara was composed by the Rabbis of the further 
East under the supervision of the Patriarch of Babylon, and was 
completed about a century later. It contains thirty-six tractates. 
Of the two works, the Babylonian is regarded as much the better, 
especially as exhibiting the manners and customs in the times of 
the Scriptures of the New Testament. This work contains 2,947 
folio pages. (See Excursus F, in Appendix.) 

3. The Chaldaic Targums. Of these there are several. They are trans- 
lations or paraphrases of most of the Hebrew Scriptures, omitting 
only the books Nehemiah, Ezra, and Daniel. They were written 
in the later Aramaic or Chaldee language when the Hebrew began 
to fall into decay. Critical opinion dates those which are regarded 
as most ancient and most valuable in the first Christian century, 
and certainly before the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple 
under Titus A. D. 70. The Targums were long preserved by oral 
transmission after the return from the captivity of Babylon. There 
are two held in high appreciation, called Onkelos, which is based 
on the Pentateuch, and another called Jonathan ben Uzziel, which 



Anticipations of the Messiah. 23 

is based upon the Hebrew prophets. They serve to illustrate the 
contemporary view and the prior teachings respecting the expected 
Messiah of the Jews, especially those views entertained at the 
time of the Nativity of Jesus Christ. 

§11. Messianic Expectations. 

The Fall in Paradise reduces to a practical form the noble legend of the 
Golden Age, cherished especially in prehistoric Greece. — Glad- 
stone. 

The expectation of a Golden Age that should return to earth was com- 
mon in all the heathen nations. — Dr. Ezra Abbot. 

I would with such perfection govern, to excel the Golden Age. — Shake- 
speare. 

I will give Thee for a Covenant of the people, for a Light of the Gentiles. 
— Isaiah. 

The Desire of Nations shall cOme ; and I will fill this house with glory , 
saith the Lord of Hosts. — Haggai. 

And we have the Word of Prophecy made more sure, whereunto ye do 
well to take heed, as unto a lamp shining in a dark place until the 
day dawn, and the Day-star arise in your hearts. — Peter. 

ARGUMENT. 
Ancient writings were numerous in the literature of different languages, 
anticipating the advent of One who was to be born in Palestine, 
and become the Ruler of the world. This expectation, common 
in all the best civilizations, looked for his descent from heaven in 
the Golden Age of mankind. At first it was the period for the 
realization which was so frequently voiced by pagan poet and his- 
torian, but gradually the conviction developed that an Unknown 
Person, in whom would center all interests, would appear in that 
"great Age to come." 

The literature of this apprehension, however, was due to the 
authoritative prediction of the Hebrew prophets, who, again, re- 
ferred the origin of the notion to a revelation from God. The 
people idealized the hope for a secular monarchy. If it shall be 
found that this was a misplacement of the predictions given, the 
inquiry will be legitimated whether all the lines of prophecy, and 
the lines of history alike, do not center in the person of Jesus 
Christ, whose coming when he did, and establishing a Spiritual 
Kingdom, has, in the highest sense, introduced the Golden Age of 
Mankind, and that Jesus alone in his imperishable Character and In- 
fluence, is entitled to be known as the Man of History. 

1. The Golden Age as Preparation for Messiah's Advent. 

2. Scripture and Talmudic Teachings of His Incarnation. 

3. Testimonies of Adversaries who misinterpret the Facts. 

4. Critical Considerations, and the Inductions Warranted. 



24 Historical Evidence of the ISTew Testament. 

MESSIANIC EXPECTATIONS. 

The foremost civilizations of antiquity lived in the expec- 
tation of the return of the Golden Age. Classic writers* never 
§ 12. Golden wear i e d of mentioning their belief in the recur- 
ve- rence of that period of primeval happiness and in- 
nocence from which they were conscious that the race had once 
departed. The pagans referred this return to the reign of 
Saturn. In classic literature, the Golden Age began with the 
time of Livius Andronicus, 1 and extended to the death of the 
Emperor Augustus. 2 For a long period, however, this ideal re- 
mained as a beautiful dream, having no reference to a Person, 
or to Royalty, or to Divinity, or to an Incarnation. At length, 
other influences were at work molding the nations to a better 
apprehension. 

In making his march of conquests 3 through Asiatic coun- 
tries, Alexander the Great brought with him the Greek letters 
and language which became the medium of international inter- 
course and commerce. It is related that Ptolemy Philadelphus, 
of Egypt, made request 4 of the Jews of Palestine to have 
seventy Rabbis sent down to Alexandria to translate the Old 
Testament Scriptures into the common Greek, that a copy 
might have place in the famous Alexandrine Library. Hence 
this Greek translation is known by the number engaged in the 
work of translation — the Septuagint. The effect of this move- 
ment was to give to the nations the teachings of the Hebrew 
Scriptures, which served to mold the expectations respecting 
the Golden Age into an apprehension of a Divine Person who 
should descend from heaven, whose advent became the central 
thought of the Golden Age. Hence Yergil, about forty years 
before the Nativity of Jesus, wrote : 

The last Age decreed by the Fates is come, 
And a new frame of all things doth begin ; 



*The principal classic writers who refer to the Golden Age were Plautus, 
Terence, Lucretius, Catullus, CaBsar, Cicero, Sallust, Propertius, Vergil, Tibullus, 
Livy, Ovid, Horace, and Hesiod ( Works and Days, 109). 

IB. C. 250. a A. D. 14. 3 B.C. 333. *A. D. 280. 



Anticipations of the Messiah. 25 

A Holy Progeny from heaven descends 
Auspicious in his birth, which puts an end 
To the Iron Age, from which shall arise 
The Golden Age, most glorious to behold / 5 

The narrative of the Fall in Genesis furnishes the first 
promise of a Redeemer. The promise, which was predictive 
in character, was coeval with the expulsion of §13 TheScrip _ 
our first parents from Paradise. But the predic- tures. 
tion was expressed in terms so general that, in effect, it was as 
broad as the race of man. Meantime there would be constant 
conflict, and a final conquest. God said : " I will put enmity 
between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her 
seed : it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise [snap at] 
his heel." 6 But here is no restriction to a given time or 
place or person for the realization. The hope is dim and dis- 
tant, but accordant with the simplicity of the primitive faith. 
However the promise then, it was reserved for after ages to 
unfold the supreme meaning in a series of gradual and pro- 
gressive revelations. These came at each crisis in the world's 
providential history, when the promise narrowed more and 
more, and the world's hope received in each instance added 
details and new inspiration related to the Messiah. In the 
passage of the ages, the Messianic thought became gradually 
but amply developed. 

It was not until the time of Abraham that they knew from 
what nation the expected Messiah should come : " I will bless 
them that bless thee, . . . and in thee shall all the families of 
the earth be blessed." 7 Then were realized the words of 
Jesus: "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: he 
saw it and was glad!" 8 It was not until the death of Jacob 
that they knew from what tribe he should be found : " Judah, 
thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise. . . . The scepter 
shall not depart from Judah nor a lawgiver from between 
his feet, until Shiloh 9 come, and unto him shall the gathering 

&Eclogeiv. 6 Gen.iii, 15. 7 Gen. xii, 3. 8 John viii, 56. 

9 tlTty, Peace-maker, i. e. Messiah, from Th\S rest. 



26 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

of the people be." The Book of Eevelation supplements the 
statement by the expression: "Behold the Lion of the tribe 
of Judah : the Root of David hath prevailed." 10 It was not 
until the time of David that they knew of what family Mes- 
siah would come : " The Lord hath sworn in truth unto David 
... Of the fruit of thy body will I set upon thy throne." n 
" I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever." tt " In 
that day there shall be a fountain opened in the house of 
David . . . for sin and for uncleanness." 13 It was not until the 
time of Isaiah that they knew what character of woman should 
give him birth : " Therefore the Lord himself shall give you 
a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and 
shall call his name Immanuel," which Matthew cites, add- 
ing, " Which being interpreted is, God with us." u Nor did 
they know of what person Messiah should be born, until Ga- 
briel appeared and himself declared unto " a virgin espoused 
to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David ; and 
the virgin's name was Mary." 15 a Fear not, Mary, . . . thou 
shalt bring forth a Son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus. He 
shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest : 
and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father 
David ; and he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever ; 
and of his kingdom there shall be no end." 16 Nor did they 
know at what place Messiah should be born until the time of 
Micah : " But thou, Bethlehem Ephratha, though thou be little 
among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall come 
forth unto me [One that is] to be the Ruler in Israel, whose 
goings forth have been from old, from everlasting." 17 

§ 14. Jewish Literature. 

a) Jewish Talmud. Talmudic literature is replete with 
interesting references to Messianic expectations based upon 
Hebrew prophecy as taught by the ancient Rabbis respecting 
both the birth and the character of the " Coming One." 

A. Messiah's Birth. The continuance of the world will 

10 Rev. v, 5. "Ps.cxxxii,ll. 12 2 Sam. vii,13. i3z e ch.xiii,l. "Isa.vii, 

14 ; Matt, i, 22, 23. « Luke i, 26, 27. 16 Luke i, 30-33. « Mic. v, 2 : Matt, ii, 6. 



Anticipations of the Messiah. 27 

be for "a week of heavenly days;" "two thousand years of 
confusion ; two thousand years under the Law ; and two thou- 
sand are the days of the Messiah." 18 "After the two thousand 
years of the Law, according to the decree, Messiah ought to 
come." According to this calculation, it was exactly at the 
close of the period when "the fullness of time was come," that 
Messiah did appear in the birth and person of Jesus Christ. 
" He came unto his own [nation] but his own received him not." 19 
Rabbi Frey says that now many of the most distinguished 
Rabbis agree with the famous Rab, that the time is long past 
from every viewpoint, according to the Hebrew Scriptures, 
when Messiah must have come, and we must look into the 
past to identify him. The Rabbis say, " The right time for 
Messiah's advent is passed, and he is now believed to have 
been born." " For the Messiah is born; his name is Menachem 
\Gomforter\P "Messiah was born at the royal residence of 
Bethlehem in Judaea," In the Talmudic book called "Gene- 
rations," it is said : " Jesus of Nazareth was born . . . under 
the Emperor Augustus; and at the same time there lived [at 
Jerusalem] Rabbi Simeon ben Hillel and Jochanan ben Zacha. 
From this time begin the years of the Nazarene" or the Chris- 
tian era. 

B. His Incarnation. Founded upon Isaiah's prediction of 
the Messiah's virgin mother, the Rabbis record that Messiah 
was born of a virgin, with the added emphasis that "He 
should be without an earthly father," because he should not be 
the progeny of any man, but should be " the seed of the 
woman;" and appearing in the order of Melchizedek, he 
would come into the world without an ancestry, and leave the 
world without a posterity. This proposition is substantially 
conveyed by ancient Rabbis in different forms of expression as 
follows : * 

1. " Come see the way of the blessed God is not like that of flesh and 
blood. For the Lord hath created a new thing: a woman shall 

* For references to the Jewish Talmud and the Scriptural bases, see Rabbi 
Frey's Messiahship of Jesus, pp. 125, 126, 137. 

!8 Edzard, 66; Schottgen, ii, 963. » John i. 11. 



28 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

compass a Man." Jer, xxxi, 22. " This is the King Messiah of 
whom it is written: Thou art my Son: this day have I begotten thee. 31 
(Psa. 11, 7.) 

2. "This is that seed which shall arise from a different place. . . . It 

is the King Messiah." 

3. "The Man whose name is Branch shall grow out of his place by a 

different principle of generation." (Isa. xi, 1; Jer. xxiii, 5, 6.) 

4. " The Redeemer whom I will raise up among you, shall not have a 

father, according to Zechariah" (vi, 12, 13). 

5. " The birth of the Messiah alone shall not be like that of any other 

creatures in the world ;" but is an Incarnation. 

6. "The birth of the Messiah alone shall be without defect;" that is, 

sinless. 

7. "The birth of the Messiah shall be like the dew from the Lord, as 

drops upon the grass expect not the labor of man." 

8. " None shall know his Father until he tells it." (John vii, 27 ; ix, 29.) 

9. " The King Messiah shall be revealed in the land of Galilee." 

(John ii, 1-11; Luke iv, 14-22.) 

These rabbinical references descriptive of the Messiah's 
Nativity are peculiarly Jewish conceptions and expression. 
The Incarnation of the Messiah is the central thought. They 
not only apply to Jesus of Nazareth, but to no others ; and 
they accentuate his identity with the Messiahship both in 
character and fact. The revelation of the Messianic character 
and person, and his relation as Prophet, Priest, and King, 
came through Hebrew prophets. 20 But the realization of his 
coming and ruling, his power and glory, was by no means re- 
stricted to the Hebrew people and commonwealth. They 
were the medium for the communication of the great fact 
and interests involved applying to the whole human race. 
Nevertheless, Israel failed of the great apprehension, and mis- 
interpreted that which was wholly spiritual, as being wholly 
secular and restorative of the Hebrew nation from the oppres- 
sions of the Romans, to their ancient kingdom and splendor. 21 

ft) Chaldaic Targum. These writings illustrate and evi- 
dence what the traditional teachings had been previously to 
the Nativity of Jesus, as well as the contemporary view enter- 



20 Psa. ii, xl, ex; Isa. ii, xi, liii. 

2i Acts i, 6; Luke xxii, 24-30; xxiv, 21; Mark xi, 10. 



Anticipations of the Messiah. 29 

tained respecting the Messiah's coming. The written para- 
phrases belong to the first half of the first Christian century. 

A. The Targum of Onkelos is very restricted and exact in 
expression, but being limited to the Pentateuch, the Messianic 
references are necessarily scanty. 

a) Shiloh. "Till Shiloh come:" " Till Messiah comes, whose is the 
kingdom, and to whom is the gathering of the nations/' 22 

/S) Balaam. "A king shall arise from Jacob, and a Messiah shall be 
anointed from Israel." * 3 

B. Targum of Jonathan covering the Prophets, makes 
frequent reference to Messiah, and the references are accord- 
ant with later teachings. 

7) A King. "A King shall come forth from the sons of Jesse, and 
Messiah shall arise from his sons' sons. This is the Branch of the Lord, 
the son given to the house of David, who shall endure forever, in whose 
time shall be much peace." M 

5) Descent. Messiah is David's Son, who " shall go forth from them, 
and be revealed from the midst of them, and teach them the worship of 
the Lord, as the mystical Shepherd to whom the flock should be restored, 
in whom all the just should trust, and all the humble dwell under the 
shadow of His kingdom." 25 

e) Redeemer. "Because God hath cleansed their souls from sins, 
they shall see the kingdom of their Messiah, they shall have many sons 
and daughters, they shall prolong their days, and keeping the Law of the 
Lord they shall be happy according to His good pleasure." 

y) Jewish People. As already seen there were fragments 
and aspects related to the Messianic personality and character 
scattered along through the Old Testament which the apostles 
have gathered up and framed into a living portrait of the 
Christ of God. The Gospels exhibit how widespread was the 
understanding with the people, and how keen was their antici- 
pation of his advent, at the time of Christ's coming. He is 
especially referred to as a Prophet in a pre-eminent sense, as 
the Son of David, as the Messiah of Scripture, as the Son of 
God. These terms were all designations of the Messianic 
Person : and they are all applied to Jesus Christ. John by 



82 Gen. xlix, 10. a* Isa. xi, 1 ; iv. 2 ; Jer. xxiii, 5 ; xxxiii, 15 ; Isa. ix, 6. 

» Num. xxiv, 17. 25 Hos. iii, 5; Jer. xxx, 9; xxxiii, 13-15; Ezek. xvii, 23. 



30 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

his preaching intensified the people's sense of apprehension on 
this subject. When multitudes thronged to his baptism, some 
questioned whether he himself was not the Messiah. They said : 

" Who art thou ? And he confessed, and denied not, but confessed, 
I am not the Christ." "Ye yourselves bear me witness that I said, I 
am not the Christ, but that I am sent before Him." 26 " What then, art 
thou Elijah? And he saith, I am not. Art thou that Prophet f and he 
answered, No." 27 The Pharisees asked the blind-born: " What sayest 
thou of him in that he opened thine eyes ? And he said, He is a 
Prophet." 28 When Cleopas and another disciple knew not Jesus on the 
day of his rising, they related to him the crucifixion, " Concerning Jesus 
of Nazareth, who was a Prophet, mighty in deed and word before God 
and all the people. . . But we trusted that it had been he which 
should have redeemed Israel." 29 When, on the last and great day of the 
feast Jesus at the temple addressed the people, some of the multitude, 
when they heard his words, said : " This is of a truth the Prophet: others 
said, This is the Christ. But some said, What, doth the Christ come out 
of Galilee ? Hath not the Scripture said that the Christ cometh of the 
seed of David, and from Bethlehem, the village where David was?" 30 
Peter said to the people : " And it shall be that every soul which will not 
hearken to that Prophet, shall be utterly destroyed from among the 
people. Yea, and all the prophets from Samuel, and them that followed 
after, as many as have spoken, they also told of these days." 31 

Nevertheless, the people's hope had been much secularized 

by rabbinical teachings. Even the disciples were expecting 

Christ to come and establish an earthly kingdom, in which 

some of them were ambitious to occupy places of honor. Yet 

twice at least directly, and oftener by indirection, did the 

disciples identify and call Jesus " Messiah." 

" Andrew first findeth his own brother Simon, and saith unto him, 
We have found the Messiah, which is being interpreted the Christ." 32 
"Philip findeth Nathanael and saith unto him, We have found him of 
whom Moses in the Law and the Prophets did write, Jesus of Nazareth, 
the son of Joseph." 33 Nathanael approaching Jesus said, " Rabbi, thou 
art the Son of God: thou art King of Israel." 34 

At Csesarea-on-the-Sea, Paul said unto King Agrippa II: 

" And now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made 
of God unto our fathers ; unto which promise our twelve tribes, instantly 

26 Luke iii, 16 ; John i, 20 ; iii, 28. 29 Luke xxiv, 19, 21. 32 j hn i, 41. 

27 John 1, 21. so John vii, 40, 41,42. ^Ib. i, 45. 

28 John ix, 17. 31 Acts iii, 23, 24. ^ lb. i,4Q. 



Anticipations of the Messiah. 31 

serving God day and night, hope to come." 35 With " the just and de- 
vout Simeon," many were " waiting for the Consolation of Israel ;" 
" and it was revealed unto him that he should not see death before that 
he had seen the Lord's Christ." And taking the child up in his arms, 
he said: " Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, O Lord, accord- 
ing to thy word ; for mine eyes have seen thy salvation which thou hast 
prepared before the face of all peoples ; a light for revelation to the 
Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel." 36 

These instances indicate how widespread and constant was 
the anticipation of "the Coming One" among the Jewish 
people, but also illustrate their identification of the Messianic 
Person. Nevertheless, there remained doubts with some re- 
specting where Messiah should be born, and hence questioning 
about his identity. Some of Jerus alem said : 

"Do the rulers know indeed that this is the very Christ? How- 
beit we know this man whence he is ; but when Christ cometh, no man 
knoweth whence He is." 37 " Many of the people . . . said, Of a truth 
this is the Prophet. Others said, This is the Christ. But some said, 
Shall Christ come out of Galilee ? Hath not the Scripture said, That 
Christ cometh of the seed of David, and out of the town of Bethlehem 
where David was ? So there was a division among the people because of 
him." S8 At Capernaum they said: " Is not this Jesus the son of Joseph, 
whose father and mother we know ? How is it then that he saith, I 
came down from heaven ? " 39 The Pharisees said unto Nicodemus : 
" Art thou also of Galilee ? Search and look ; for out of Galilee ariseth 
no Prophet." 40 When Jesus wrought miracles upon the dumb, the 
blind, and the possessed, "All the people were amazed, and said: Is not 
this the Son of David ? 41 Two blind men followed him and cried : "Thou 
Son of David, have mercy on us." * 2 Jesus himself said to the Pharisees, 
"What think ye of Christ? Whose Son is He? They say unto him, 
The Son of David. He saith unto them, How then doth David in the 
Spirit call him Lord? . . If David then call him Lord, how is he his 
Son ? And no man was able to answer him a word, neither durst any 
man ask him any more questions." 43 And in his last and triumphal 
march to Jerusalem, the people shouted: " Hosanna to the Son of 
David: " " Blessed be the kingdom of our father David that cometh in 
the name of the Lord." 44 

§ 15. Other Nations. 

a) Wise Men. Even the Magi, who had traversed stream 
and mountain and desert from the distant East, came to Jeru- 

85 Acts xxvi, 6, 7. 38 J6. vil) 4i, 42. 40 j&. viij 52. 42 i 6 . iXj 27; xx, 30. 

ss Luke ii, 25, 26, 28-32. 39 75. V L 42. « Matt, xii, 23. « lb. xxii, 41-46. 

37 John vii, 26, 27. « Matt, xxi, 9 ; Mark xi, 10 ; Luke xix, 38. 
3 



32 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

salem, saying: "Where is lie that is born King of the Jews, 
for we have seen his star in the east, and have come to 
worship him." 45 

P) Canaanite. The woman of Canaan understood the situ- 
ation when she cried out after Jesus : " Have mercy on me, O 
Lord, thou Son of David: my daughter is grievously vexed 
with a devil." 46 

y) Samaritans. The Samaritan woman at the well said to 
Jesus: "I know that Messias cometh who is called Christ: 
when He is come, he will declare all things unto us. Jesus 
saith unto her: I that speak unto thee am he" She reported 
to the men of the city: "Come, see a man who told me all 
things that ever I did; can this be the Christ?" And from 
that city "many Samaritans believed on him because of the 
word of the woman who testified, He told me all things that 
ever I did. . . . And many more believed because of his word ; 
and they said unto the woman : Now we believe, not because 
of thy speaking; for we have heard him ourselves, and know 
that this is indeed the Savior of the World" 47 

In ascertaining how deep and widespread was the persua- 
sion of men of the coming of the Messiah, the Scriptures have 
been cited in illustration, the same as any other literature. 
This is legitimate since the Scriptures are the only source from 
which we derive the Messianic idea; and these writings are 
indispensable in learning what the Messianic idea was. They 
published abroad among the family of nations the advent of 
One who should be known as "the Prince of Peace"® whose 
coming would introduce, in the spiritual and supreme sense, 
the Golden Age of the world. Prophecy had distinctly declared 
that "The Desire of Nations shall come;" 49 and "the isles 
shall wait for his Law:" 50 "and on his name shall the Gentiles 
hope," 51 whose dominion shall be "an everlasting dominion 
which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall 



«Matt.ii,2. «2&.xv, 22. « John iv, 25, 26, 29, 39, 41, 42. «i sa . ix, 6. 

« 9 Hag. ii, 7. 50 Isa. xlii, 4. " Kal iv ry opSfiari avrov idvt] i\iriov<riv, Matt, xii, 21. 



Anticipations of the Messiah. 33 

not be destroyed." 52 As "the fullness of time" 53 was at hand, 
the conviction deepened as it was already widespread, in wait- 
ing expectancy of Messiah's advent, due probably to the trust 
and activity of the Jews of the Dispersion, who in all lands 
abroad had been teaching the Greek Scriptures of the Septu- 
agint. As remarked by a learned writer : 

" By their dispersion among so many nations, by their conversations 
with the learned men among the heathen, and the [Jews' ] translation [the 
Septuagint] of their inspired writings into a language almost universal, 
the principles of their religion were spread all over the East; and it 
became the common belief that a Prince would arise at that time in 
Judsea, and would change the face of the world, and extend his empire 
from one end of the earth to the other." M 

Meantime, Jesus of Nazareth was born in Bethlehem of 
Judaea, exactly accordant with every predicted circumstance 
mentioned in the ancient Scriptures. He lived his life; he 
wrought his works; he completed his ministry; he fulfilled 
the Messianic hope; he claimed the Messianic character as 
the Christ of Scripture. But in one particular he disap- 
pointed Jewish expectation grievously. He refused absolutely 
to become monarch of the Jewish commonwealth. Before the 
people and before Pilate, he rejected all claims to a temporal 
kingship. "When Jesus therefore perceived that they would 
come and take him by force, and make him a king, he with- 
drew again into a mountain, himself alone." B And when the 
Roman procurator asked him pointedly, "Art thou the king of 
the Jews? . . . Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this 
world." 56 This was an absolute repudiation of an earthly 
kingdom. He would not deliver the Jews from the Koman 
yoke. Therefore they ignored his Messianic claims; they 
rejected his divine character; they crucified his person; and 
ever since, in order to vindicate their own prophetic Scrip- 
tures, they have had recourse to some heathen ruler as the 
"Chosen One," who, so far from delivering them from the 

52 Dan. vii, 14. 53G a i. i v . 4; Eph. i, 10. &«Dr. Henderson Buck in the End, 
Helig. Knowl., 1859, p. 859. 56 John vi, 15. 56 John xviii, 33, 36. 



34 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

oppressive Romans, one actually came at the head of the 
Roman army and utterly destroyed their nation. 

About thirty-five years after the crucifixion, Vespasian, a 

Roman general of distinction, with the imperial army invaded 

Palestine for the express purpose of subjugating 

' mony of the rebellious Jews. At the headquarters the 

Adversaries. newg wag rece i ve a ft^ t h e Emperor of Rome 

was dead. Thereupon the soldiery immediately proclaimed 
Vespasian emperor. Accordingly, Vespasian turned over his 
large and powerful command to his son Titus, who accom- 
panied him in this campaign, while he himself went to the 
imperial capital to assume the purple and prerogatives of the 
throne. This circumstance explains the testimonies now to be 
introduced. 

a) Vergil. It has already been seen how this poet anticipated that 
" the last age had come" when a new era would begin ; "a Holy Progeny 
from heaven descends, auspicious in his birth," who should introduce 
" the Golden Age, most glorious to behold. ,,b ' 1 

j8) Josephus. "That which did especially inspire them [the Jews] 
to undertake this war was an ambiguous oracle found likewise in their 
Sacred Writings, how that some one of their own country , pertaining to that 
time, should attain the empire of the habitable earth. The Jews took this 
prediction to belong to themselves in particular, and many of their wise 
men were deceived thereby in their judgment." After this testimony, 
he adds his opinion: "Now this oracle certainly denoted the govern- 
ment of Vespasian, who was appointed emperor [while he was yet] in 
Judaea." 58 

7) Suetonius. "A firm persuasion had long prevailed through all 
the East, that it was fated [i. e., contained in the Book of Fates or 
Prophecies] at that time, to devolve on some one who should come 
forth from Judaea. This prediction referred to the Roman emperor 
[Vespasian] as the event proved ; but the Jews, applying it to them- 
selves, engaged in rebellion." 59 

5) Tacitus. Speaking of the prodigies which occurred prior to the 
destruction of Jerusalem, he says: "A few turned these events into a 
cause for alarm ; the greater number were possessed with a belief that 



57 Ecloge iv; cf. Ovid, i, 89, and Eusebius, Praeparationis Evangelic®, Lib. i, 7; 
xii, 13. 68 ^5- Kara rbv Kaipbv iiceivov airb tt}? x^pa-S" rig- avrQv, Wars VI, 5, $ 4. 

5» u Precrebuerat Oriente toto, vetus et constans opinio, esse in fatis ut eo tempore, 
Judaea profecti rerum potirentur. Id, de Imperatore Romano, quantum eventu 
postea predictum parait, Judaei ad se trahentes, rebellarunt." Vespas. 4. 



Anticipations of the Messiah 35 

it was written in the ancient writings of the priests that it would come 
to pass at that very time, that the East would grow mighty, and that men 
proceeding from Judaea would gain the empire of the world — an ambig- 
uous oracle which had foretold [the fortunes of] Vespasian and Titus." 60 
e) Celsus. Eepresenting himself as bemg a Jew, he says: "The 
prophets declare Him coming to be great, the Potentate of all the earth, 
Lord of the nations and armies." " How should we, having made known 
to all mankind that there is to come from God One punishing the wicked, 
dishonor him having come ?" 61 

CRITICAL CONSIDERATIONS. 

There was a widespread conviction among the nations of a 
Golden Age to come ; that it would be marked by the advent 
of a Personage descended from heaven who would g 17< The Fact 
become the Kuler of the world ; that this expect a- Predicted, 
tion was of long continuance, whose realization was related to 
a definite period, — are so many facts affirmed absolutely by 
the several writers cited. Of the five writers quoted, one was 
a Latin poet, one was an eclectic philosopher, and three were 
historians, of whom one was a Jewish priest, and two were 
Koman authors of fame. Not one of the five can be said to 
have been friendly to Christ or his cause. Nevertheless, the 
ideas of every one on this subject were evidently derived from 
the Scriptures, as is obvious from the reference to "the Book 
of Fates," which is the heathen designation of the Hebrew 
prophets kept in the custody of the priests. They agree on 
the main facts, but differ on the details. The Jews them- 
selves, unto whom the facts predicted were given by Divine 
revelations, and in whose special interests they were to have 
realization, were instructed from the first to understand that 
the application of this prophecy was absolutely and exclu- 
sively to be made to Messiah, who was the burden of these 
Sacred Writings ; and that when he should appear, these pre- 
dictions should find definite and complete verification in his 

60 Hist, v, 13: "Pluribus persuasio inerat, antiquis sacerdotum Uteris conti- 
neri eo ipso tempore fore, ut valesceret Oriens, profectique Judsea rerum potir- 
entur. Quae ambages Vespasianum ac Titum praedixerant." Westcott's transl. 
Introd. to Gospels, 152. ei Qrigen contra Celsum, Lib. ii, c. 29; ii, 8. 



36 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

history. This circumstance is of paramount importance in 
determining the right interpretation of the facts involved; for 
while the demands of the predictive text have never been 
applicable to any other man in history than Jesus Christ, his 
case fails in no particular of being the intended realization. 
But at the time of his advent, the teachers taught that Mes- 
siah would appear as a political Deliverer, who would rescue 
them from Roman domination, and give them back their tem- 
poral kingdom with all its ancient glory. They overlooked 
the fact that their lawgiver would depart from his place when 
Shiloh should come. In Jewish apprehension, with notable 
exceptions, there was a missing of the true sense and grandeur 
of Christ's character and identity. Certainly no one ever arose 
to gi/ce the Jewish nation deliverance from the Romans. Upon 
the contrary, the jRomans destroyed the Jewish nation, burned 
down their temple, and abolished their whole system of religious 
ceremony. Historically, they are to-day as they have been for 
nea?'ly two thousand years, without a nationality, without a 
theocracy, without a temple, without a sacrifice, without a priest, 
and without a Messiah/ * 

It is the peculiarity of the attesting witnesses that, in inter- 
preting the predictive fact, they mention the expression of 
"the oracle" as being both "mysterious" and 

Person "ambiguous," as seemingly best suited to their 
Predicted. w i s ]2 es# n j s obviously scant ground to rest a 
conclusion upon, that because Yespasian, who, at the head of 
the Roman army, came as an invader of the Jews' land and 
nation, having entered upon the country, was called thence to 
the imperial throne, he met all the demands of the predicted 
Messiah. Josephus is explicit in saying that "One of their 
own country " (of the Jews), not two foreigners from Italy, as 
Tacitus asserts, "should become the Ruler of the habitable 
earth" Yespasian was no Jew; he did not arise in the Jews' 
country, but was a Roman and belonged to Rome. The Jews 

* See Hosea ill, 4. 



Anticipations of the Messiah. 37 

expected their Messiah to come as " the Prince of Peace," but 
Vespasian came as a man of war. The Jews expected that 
Messiah would establish for them an independent monarchy ; 
whereas Yespasian took from them the last of their ancient 
kingdom and glory. The Jews had hoped to acquire an undi- 
vided possession of their own land ; but Yespasian expatriated 
all the people from their native Palestine. The Jews were 
expected to occupy a position in which they could dominate 
the Gentile nations about them ; but Yespasian devastated their 
country and reduced their people to a condition of absolute 
slavery. The Jews expected a Messianic deliverance from 
Roman power, bringing untold prosperity and happiness to 
their nation; but Yespasian brought them "tribulation, such 
as there hath not been the like from the beginning of the cre- 
ation which God had created until now, and never shall be." ® 
Dr. Philip Schaff has aptly remarked : 

"Tacitus and Suetonius speak of a widespread expectation of that 
kind, at the time of the Jewish war and before, but falsely refer it to 
the Roman emperors Vespasian and Titus. In this the heathen histo- 
rians follow Josephus, who well knew and believed the Messianic hopes 
of his people, and yet was not ashamed basely to betray and pervert 
them." 63 

In critical investigation, it is indispensable to difference 
that which is fact from that which is the mere opinion of the 
witness respecting the fact; between the revealed §19 Factand 
Messianic anticipation, and the perverted interjpre- Opinion. 
tation applied to it. Opinion is not evidence. However sin- 
cerely a historian may entertain a speculative conclusion, it is 
not evidential. Mere sincerity can not stand for history. 
Facts are the canon of truth and sound reasoning on historical 
questions. The Messianic fact, however, is secure and can not 
be destroyed by misapprehension or perversion or misapplica- 
tion. If it should be said that the claims of Jesus to the Mes- 
siahship are rendered uncertain from the circumstance that 



«a Mark xiii, 19; Matt, xxiv, 21. ^Hist. Christ. Churchy Vol. I, p. 114, Note 1. 



38 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

"false Christs" have arisen, as in the case of Bar-Kocheba, 64 
in the reign of Hadrian, in which thousands of Jewish adher- 
ents lost their lives, the sufficient reply is, that no number of 
false Christs proves that a true Christ never existed. If there 
were no original, there would be no imitation ; if there were 
no genuine coin issued, there would be no reason for spurious 
coin to exist. False evidence can not disprove the truth. 

Unquestionably even the disciples of Jesus until the Pente- 
cost were misled by their unspiritual preconceptions of what 
Messiah's kingdom and reign were to be. They obviously be- 
lieved that the Son and successor of David meant literally 
David's royalty and realm. As the disciples accompanied the 
Master to the Mount of Ascension, they asked him: "Lord, 
wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom of Israel?" 65 
But from the day when the " demonstration of the Spirit and of 
the power" came upon them, they stood upon a higher plane, 
and had a realizing sense of Christ's saying before Pilate, "My 
kingdom is not of this world." 66 

There is some discrepancy between Josephus and the Roman 
historians respecting the date when the Messianic prediction of 
§ 20. The Time Efogg&i should find its fulfillment. Tacitus and 
Predicted. Suetonius are much more definite as to the exact 
point of time contemplated by this prophecy. The Roman 
writers refer the realization to the year 69, when Yespasian 
was invading Palestine, but was recalled to assume the rule of 
the empire, instead of the year of Christ's Nativity which 
occurred about B. C. 4. Suetonius says definitely "at that 
time" 67 meaning the time when Vespasian received the impe- 
rial crown. He declares that the anticipation was " an old and 
unvarying expectation" abroad among the nations. Tacitus 
is even more emphatic in dating the occurrence " at that very 
time"® referring also to the occasion when Yespasian assumed 
the imperial purple and power. But Josephus, on whose au- 
thority both relied, says merely, "During that time" as a 

c* A. D. 132-135. 66 John xvill, 36. 68 Eo ipso tempore. 

w Acts 1, 6. 67 Eo tempore. 



Anticipations of the Messiah. 39 

period, " One from their own country [Palestine'] should obtain 
the empire of the habitable earth" m Long after the Je ws's na" 
tionality had been destroyed, with the persistency character- 
istic of that people, did they carry forward their cherished 
hope of a Messiah who would become the Governor of their 
restored nation. But many of their most learned and judicious 
Rabbis are now, not looking into the future for their King, 
but into the past; and some have found him in the Man of 
Nazareth. 

Quite a number of claimants have arisen in the past ages 
for the place and honors of Messiah. But they brought with 
them none of the Christly credentials. Each one §21 The 
in turn has been relegated to the list of impostors. Christ. 
Only One ever absolutely met the demands of the predictive 
text. If Jesus Christ was not the realization of Messianic 
prophecy, there never was, and there never will be, a Messiah- 
Savior. There never was, and there never can be, but the one 
time for his coming. All conditions were present when Jesus 
came; and all characteristics centered in his person. No hu- 
man being as he ever so impressed himself upon the conscious- 
ness of the world, and made that impression imperishable! 
For nearly two thousand years the crucified One has lived 
in the hearts of myriads of human beings. There never was, 
there never will be, but one Christ. "Who else could occupy 
his place in history? As was beautifully expressed by Jean 
Paul Richter, " The life of Christ concerns him who, being the 
holiest of the mighty and the mightiest of the holy, lifted, 
with his pierced hands, empires off their hinges, and turned the 
stream of centuries out of its channel, and still governs the 
Ages." 

69 In the Greek text, Josephus employs the accusative case to express con- 
tinuance of time, as during a considerable period within which the event occurred, 
rather than the use of the dative case, which would have conveyed the idea of 
a definite point of time when the expected Messiah should come. Scholars 
will observe the force of the preposition in connection with the accusative 
case: Kara rbv naiphv £k€?pov — down along, or, during that period. The testimony 
of Josephus, then, is to this effect: "Some one from their own country during 
that period of time should attain the empire of the habitable earth." 



CHAPTER II. 

NATIVITY OF JESUS CHEIST. 

I. The Four Gospels : Their Objects, Character, and Contents. 
II. The Value op mere Opinions : Not Evidential as Testimony. 

III. The Affirmations of Adversaries respecting Christ's Nativity. 

a) The Witness of the Jewish Talmud. 

/3) The Witness of the Toledoth Jeshu. 

7) The Witness of the Literary Champion, Celsus. 

5) The Witness of the Emperor, Julian the Apostate. 

IV. The Confirmation of Adversaries by Christian Writers. 

a) Witness of Ignatius, A. D. 110. 

/3) Witness of Tertullian, A. D. WO. 

7) Witness of the Apostle Paul, A. D. 56-58. 

V. Inductions Warranted by the Facts Evidenced. 
Analysii, Review and Summary of the Evidence. 
41 



Chapter II. 
THE NATIVITY OF JESUS. 

§22. Sources: Biographical Epitomes of Witnesses and Literature. 

Those hostile to Christianity whose testimony is adduced in 
this chapter are Julian the Apostate, and the rabbinical authors 
of the Jewish Talmud, and the Toledoth Jeshu, or " History of 
Jesus." Those friendly to the faith are Origen, Ignatius, and 
Tertullian. Those of modern criticism are Tischendorf, Westcott, 
and Lardner. 

1. Julian was born at Constantinople on November 6, 331 A. D., and 
died in June 26, 363, when in his thirty-second year. He ruled 
the Roman Empire conjointly about six years, but as sole emperor 
about eighteen months. History accords him eminence for genius, 
learning, and chastity of character. In his extreme ambition for 
fame he became openly hostile to Christianity. He renounced 
the Christian religion when about twenty years of age, but kept 
the fact secret from the army until after it had declared him to 
be sole emperor. Hence originated the dishonoring epithet 
ascribed to him, "the Apostate." His education had been 
nominally Christian under the direction of Eusebius, Bishop of 
Nicomedia. But the despotic rule in his education reacted in 
Julian's mind to that extent that he went over to dire paganism, 
and became as fanatical in his devotion to heathenism as he was 
a hater of the Christian religion. 

" It can not be denied that Julian was a persecutor." (Lard- 
ner. ) He proclaimed to the world that he would prove the pre- 
diction of Jesus false respecting the rebuilding of the Jews' 
temple at Jerusalem. The Savior had said, " Verily I say unto 
you, There shall not be left one stone upon another." (Matt, 
xxiv, 1, 2; Mark xiii, 2; Luke xix, 41-44; xxi, 5, 6.) Julian sent 
his personal friend Alypius to superintend the reconstruction of 
the temple at the expense of the imperial treasury, promising 
that if the Jews would return and assist in the work, on his re- 
turn from the Persian expedition, he would be present at the 
dedication, and the Mosaic sacrifices would be resumed. This he 
did, not for any regard for Judaism, but from a spirit of hatred 
toward the Christ ; an religion. But he never returned, and the 
temple was never rebuilt, and the Mosaic rites were never re- 

43 



44 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

sumed. He was mortally wounded in this campaign, and died in 
camp. He suppressed Christian schools, and meant to exter- 
minate Christianity from the earth. The skeptical Gibbon says of 
Julian: " He affected to pity the unhappy Christians, . . . but 
his pity was degraded with contempt; his contempt was em- 
bittered with hatred ; and the sentiments of Julian were expressed 
in a style of sarcastic wit which inflicted deep and deadly wounds, 
wherever it issues from the mouth of a sovereign." (Decline and 
Fall of the Roman Empire, c. xxiii, Amer. ed.) His profound 
estrangement is illustrated in several Letters while at Antioch, 
Syria, which was then the center of Christianity for the Gentiles. 
These Letters were directed against the Antiochian Christians, as 
were also his works entitled The Caesars, Misopogon, a satirical 
writing ; but with a more general purpose he designated his 
famous book entitled Kard Xpicmapuv, Against the Christians. By 
reason of a mistaken zeal this work was destroyed by Theodosius 
II, mere fragments having been preserved in Cyril's refutation of 
Julian's writing. 

2. The Talmud:* 

1. On Mary and the Nativity of Jesus: See tract Avoda Zara, 
folio 16, b ; Sanhedrin f . 67, a ; Kalla 18, b. of Babylonian Talmud ; 
also Nederim 48, a ; Kethuboth 12, a ; Seder Hadoros, p. 119 ; Zamach 
David, c. ii, p. 84. 

2. On Christ's residence in Egypt: Bab. Tal. Sanhedr. 7, a, b; 
fol. 107, b. See Heb. Talmudic Exercitations, pp. Ill, 112. 

3. On the Miracles of Jesus (explained as "Magical Arts "or 
"Sorcery"): Bab. Tal. Shabbath fol. 104, b; 107, b. Jerusalem 
Talmud, Shabbath fol. 13, 1 ; f. 4, 2. 

4. On the Crucifixion of Jesus: Bab. Tal. Sanhedr. 43, a; 67, a, 
and 107, b. 

5. On the Disciples of Jesus: Bab. Tal. Sanhedrin, 43, a. fin ; 
Avoda Zara f. 16, b. 

6. On the Disciples' Miracles: Jerus. Talmud, Shabbath fol. 14, 
4; one by James: Avoda Zara, 40, 4; fol. 16. 2; 27, 2. 

7. On the Destruction of Jerusalem: Bab. Tal. Gittin, Hannis- 
akin, fol. 56, a. 

3. Toledoth jESHuf (i. e., History or Generation of Jesus) is a rabbinical 

work of very ancient but unknown date. It is understood to have 
been taken from the Talmud, and was expressly written against 
Christ and Christianity. It purports to give an account from the 
Jews' standpoint of the birth, character, and the death of Jesus of 
Nazareth. Some years ago an English translation was made of 



* See general description of this work before chapter i, pp. 1 and 2. 
-MET nVlS'fl The W is a contraction of £W\ originally, £W)T), Joshua= 
Jesus. 



Nativity of Jesus Christ. 45 

this work in two volumes in England, under the title The Gospel 
According to the Jews. It contains some vile and wretched stories 
which the Jews put in circulation soon after the crucifixion, to 
prevent a belief in his resurrection, and therefore in Chris- 
tianity.* This opprobrious work contains also important testi- 
mony relating to the Nativity of Jesus, His Childhood, His Teach- 
ings, His Miracles, His Eoyalty, His Passion and Death, His Burial, 
and His Twelve Disciples. The work is bitter in spirit and is 
obviously based upon the Jewish Talmud. For citations of this 
work see Excursus G, VII, at the close. 

Origen of Alexandria (b. 185 A. D., d. 254) was celebrated alike for 
his genius, his scholarship, and his extraordinary influence over 
men. His father was named Leonidas, and was a rhetorician of 
high standing, who helped to educate Origen. He pursued his 
studies in the Catechetical School under the famous Clement of 
Alexandria. At eighteen, Origen became the head and successor 
of Clement, who fled from persecution to Palestine. He dili- 
gently studied philosophy under the chief masters of the several 
schools, and the different heresies which sprang up in the Chris- 
tian Church. He also traveled extensively in Arabia, Palestine, 
Greece, and Italy. He attained to eminence so rapidly that the 
principal men from abroad sought his counsel in many respects. 
Both heathen and heretics of much distinction were won over to 
Christianity in its true faith. A Gnostic of wealth named Am- 
brosius became his liberal patron, and supplied him with an in- 
valuable library and with a corps of stenographers to report his 
daily lectures, and another corps of copyists to engross the work. 
An Arabian prince visited Origen to learn from him the myste- 
rious power of his life and religion. Julia Mammsea, the mother 
of Alexander Severus (who reigned A. D. 222-235) induced him to 
come to Antioch in Syria, that she might learn the character of 
his new and strange doctrines. 

However, Bishop Demetrius, who had nominated Origen for 
the headship of the Theological School at Alexandria, in which he 
had served with conspicuous ability and success, partly from 
motives of envy, but ostensibly on the ground of false doctrines 
according to the bishop's view, used all the influence of his office 
and person to have Origen excommunicated from the Church in 
Egypt. But this was utterly without justification. The Church 
in Arabia, in Palestine, in Achaia and Phoenicia, refused to con- 
cur in that decision. Thereupon Origen manfully resigned his 
charge and position in the school as its principal, and, leaving 
the country, went to his former teacher and patron in Palestine — 



* See Justin Martyr's Dialogue with the Jew Trypho, c. xvii, and cviii in the 
Ante-Nieene Fathers, Vol. I, pp. 303, 253. 



46 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

to Clement. Under his counsel and direction, Origen opened and 
organized another school in Csesarea, which soon became even 
more famous than the one he had left in Alexandria. A former 
pupil of Origen, named Dionysius, soon became Bishop of Alex- 
andria, and was careful to invite Origen to return. He did so ; 
but the Decian persecution having set in, Origen was arrested, 
imprisoned, and was subjected to torture by the Roman Govern- 
ment for his faith, and was condemned to die as a martyr. The 
death of the Emperor Decius (251) effected his release. But hav- 
ing been loaded with a heavy chain, his constitution broken by 
torture, and his body maimed, he died soon after in the sixty- 
ninth year of his age. 

Jerome (A. D. 331-420) regarded Origen as the greatest Doctor 
who had risen in the Church since the apostles. His learning 
embraced all parts and departments of learning, philology, phi- 
losophy, and theology. With such a powerful memory he com- 
bined remarkable penetration and wide comprehensiveness of 
intellect, with a glowing imagination and power of expression. 
His commentaries are a wealth of learning and suggestiveness. 
His famous refutation oi the literary champion of opposition, 
named Celsus, in eight books, is a masterpiece, It is entitled 
Origen contra Celsum, and may be found translated in the Ante- 
Nicene Fathers, Vol. IV. 

5. Ignatius (d. 107) assumed the name Theophorus, "Bearer of God," 
having reference to the indwelling Christ. He has been called 
the " latest and greatest of the Apostolic Fathers." He was 
elected Bishop of Antioch, Syria, about seventy-four years after 
Christ's ascension. Eusebius and Jerome place him as the second 
bishop after Peter, Euodius being the first. Roman traditions 
represent him variously as the disciple of Paul, of Peter, and of 
the apostle John. He was certainly the contemporary of the 
apostles, and Chrysostom is careful to say that Ignatius "con- 
versed familiarly with them, and was perfectly familiar with their 
doctrines," and apostolic hands were laid on his head when Ignatius 
was consecrated to the episcopate. There is withal a pleasing but 
unhistorical story that Ignatius was identical with the child whom 
Jesus took up in his arms and blessed, when he said, " Of such is 
the kingdom of heaven." (Mark x, 16.) 

Ignatius having been sentenced to death for the crime of 
being a Christian, he was hurried off to Rome, where he was cast 
into the Coliseum to the wild beasts. A prisoner in chains on 
the way thither afoot, he was subjected to much rudeness and 
insult of the guard who conducted him to the capital. At Smyrna 
he met Polycarp, a fellow bishop, and he addressed his several 
letters to the Ephesians, the Magnesians, the Trallians, and the 



Nativity of Jesus Christ. 47 

Romans. At Troas there was a brief halt in the journey, where 
he wrote three additional epistles to the Philadelphians, to the 
Smyrneans, and a personal letter to Polycarp. All these are 
extant. Thence he passed to Neapolis through Macedonia, and 
thence across the Adriatic Sea, and then over the old Roman 
road to Rome. The date of his death is somewhat uncertain. 
If it occurred in A. D. 107 according to the common consensus, it 
was the same year as that in which Simeon, Bishop of Jerusalem, 
the successor of James, our Lord's brother, was martyred. 

Tertullian (150-220 or 240) was a Carthaginian and an eminent apol- 
ogist of Christianity. He was born in the city of Carthage, the 
capital of Africa, the ancient rival of Rome. His father was a 
Roman centurion in the army, serving under the proconsular 
government. He is supposed to have lived to a good age and died 
a natural death ; but nothing is really known on the subject. 

Tertullian was liberally educated in Grseco-Roman literature, 
and was learned in the law as a jurisconsult. His mind was well 
stored with history, philosophy, law, poetry, and eloquence. 
His writings bear evidence that he was well skilled in juridical 
lore, and knew well how to state the claims of the Christians 
in their defense before the highest authorities of the State. He 
understood well the doctrines of Christianity. He is called " the 
Father of Latin Theology, and one of the greatest men of an- 
tiquity." (Schaff.) The late M. Ernest Renan regarded Tertul- 
lian as " a literary phenomenon," if not indeed a prodigy. His 
translator, Holmes, mentions his style as "terse and vigorous 
expression of terse and vigorous thought." The late Cardinal 
Newman regarded him as " the most powerful writer of the early 
centuries." He was a man of profound convictions and fearless 
courage. Schaff says: "For his opponents, be they heathen or 
Jews, heretics or Catholics, he has as little indulgence and re- 
gard as Luther. With the adroitness of a special pleader, he 
entangles them in self-contradictions, pursues them in every nook 
and corner, overwhelms them with arguments,, sophisms, apo- 
thegms, and sarcasms, drives them before him with unmerciful 
lashings, and almost makes them ridiculous and contemptible. 
His polemics everywhere leave the marks of blood." {Church 
Hist., II, 819, 823, 824.) 

He nourished in the reign of Septimus Severus (193-211), and 
possibly in a part of the reign of Antoninus Caracalla (211-217). 
His Apology was a masterpiece, unexcelled in any literature. 
It was probably addressed, not to the emperor and Senate at 
Rome, but to the proconsul and chief magistrates of the African 
local government. For it is said that when the emperor visited 
Carthage and learned the facts of the Christian history under 
4 



48 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



persecutions, he disavowed the persecutions and offered a public 
apology for the inflictions of Plantinus, an unprincipled magis- 
trate. (Coffin's Ch. Fathers, p. 264.) 

THE MODERN CRITICS. 

7. Teschendorf (1815-1874) was born in Lengenfeld, in Saxony, and was 

a student under the famous Hermann and Winer in the University 
of Leipsic. He was the receipient of a medal and many prizes in 
course. In 1837 the degree of Doctor of Philosophy was conferred 
upon him. In 1839-1841 he prepared a critical edition of the 
Greek New Testament; in 1840 he succeeded in doing what no 
man had ever done previously, cleaned a palimpsest manuscript 
by means of chemicals in Paris, restoring the original writing to 
distinctness. He did this in the case of the Codex Ephraem Re- 
scriptus of the fifth century. As a recognition of his eminent 
abilities the University of Breslau thereupon bestowed upon him 
the honorary degree of Doctor of Theology. He visited the 
great libraries of Holland in 1841, and in 1842 those of England 
at Cambridge and Oxford, and spent more than 1843 in Italy. 
During the next year he repeated his visit to the East, spending 
ten months in Egypt, Palestine, and Sinai, and returned to Vienna 
and Munich. In 1853 he returned to these countries, visiting 
Sinai in 1859, when he discovered the famous Codex Sinaiticus, 
which he published in 1862. Returning, he was elected Professor 
of Paleography in the University of Leipsic, in consideration of 
his merits. Broken down by overwork, he died of apoplexy, on 
December 7, 1874. 

It has been said of him that no theologian before him received 
so many marks of honorary distinction, both academic and civil. 
" He was made a Russian noble, a Saxon privy-councilor, a knight 
of many orders, a Doctor of all academic degrees. Unquestion- 
ably, Tischendorf was the foremost scholar in paleology of the age 
in the New Testament. As a Biblical critic he was equaled by 
few, and surpassed by none in modern times. 5 ' His critical works 
number fourteen. 

8. Brooke Foss Westcott (b. 1828, d. 1901) was a graduate of Cam- 

bridge, England, bearing away high honors, with many medals 
and prizes in both classics and mathematics. He was made Canon 
of Peterborough Cathedral in 1869, Regius Professor of Divinity 
at Cambridge in 1870, honorary Chaplain to the Queen in April, 
1875, and Bishop of Durham, 1890. His chief work is his Canon of 
the New Testament during the first four centuries, 5th ed., 1861. 
He was one of the English Company who revised the New Testa- 
ment. He had no superior in his line of work. 



Nativity of Jesus Christ. 49 

9. Nathaniel Lardner (1684-1768) was educated at Utrecht and Len- 
den, Holland. He was a profound scholar and a man of rare 
judgment, who devoted himself to a work to defend the Authen- 
ticity and Credibility of the New Testament. Some regard it as 
outranking Bishop Butler's Analogy in character for thorough- 
ness. Certainly we are indebted to no man of his own time or 
since for such prolonged critical, exhaustive, and judicious dis- 
cussion of the varied subjects involved as to Dr. Lardner. His 
works consist of ten volumes octavo, London, 1838, and constitute 
a perfect thesaurus of learning and critical care. In faith he was 
a Congregational Arian. 

§23. The Nativity of Jesus Christ. 

The life of Jesus has become the center of religious controversies which 
agitate our age. The importance of this fact is great. With the 
person of Jesus Christianity stands or falls. — Tischendorp. 

The mode in which the different evangelists deal with the history of the 
incarnation and birth of our Lord offers a perfect illustration of 
their independence and special characteristics. Matthew and 
Luke combine to reveal as much of the great facts as help us to 
apprehend . . . the mode in which it was welcomed by those 
by whom God was pleased to work its accomplishment. — West- 

COTT. 

Fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which is begotten in 
her is of the Holy Spirit. And she shall bring forth a Son, and 
thou shalt call His name Jesus. — Angel of the Lord. 

The "Word was God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among 
us, and we beheld His glory as of the only begotten from the 
Father, full of grace and truth. — John. 

When the fullness of time came, God sent forth his Son, born of a 
woman. — Paul. 

'Evp^Kafiev rbv Meaalav (8 £<ttiv /xedepfxrjvevo/JLepov Xpia-rog-). We have found the 
Messiah, which is, being interpreted, Christ. — Andrew. 

ARGUMENT. 

Men's mere opinions have no authority whatsoever or evidential value 
in historical investigation. But concessions of fact and truth 
made by those in opposition are invaluable in reasoning, and pre- 
clude further argument. Moreover the denial of a supposed fact, 
of the past to the witness, indicates a conviction on the part of 
the opposition which existed prior to the denial, proving the his- 
toricity of the question so far ; and the statement thereof logically 



50 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

must be refuted by the denier on sound reasons, or the original 
affirmation being of long standing must be considered valid. 

Enemies of Christianity attest the actuality of the birth of 
Jesus, declaring the event to be absolutely historical. They wit- 
ness to the belief of the primitive Christians, that Jesus was truly 
begotten of the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin Mary, in the 
time of Quirinius. These testimonies are in exact accordance with 
the statements of the Gospels. As already seen, Talmudic litera- 
ture concedes that the time for Messiah's advent has long since 
past, that it has actually occurred, on a "different principle of 
generation 5 ' from humanity, being born of "the seed of a 
woman," but without an earthly father. There is to be added 
now the witness of enemies to the lineage, the tribe, the time 
and place of birth of the only One who fulfilled all the predictions 
respecting the Messiahship, and who has impressed himself im- 
perishably upon the consciousness of mankind for nearly two 
thousand years past. 

The principal points now to be considered are : 

1. What the Gospels affirm respecting the Nativity of Jesus Christ. 

2. How far Adversaries confirm the Statements of the Evangelists. 

3. The Incarnation a Subject not open to Historical Investigation. 

Before there is anything to investigate, it must be ascer- 
tained precisely what the Gospels have affirmed relative to 
the Nativity of Jesus. In such inquiry the standpoint of each 
writer of the four Gospels should be taken, and the special 
object had in view by each writer should be clearly seen. 
What, then, are the main facts stated therein to be read and 
believed, touching the birth of Jesus Christ? 

THE GOSPELS. 

Matthew, being a Hebrew, first wrote his Gospel in the 

Hebrew language for the special advantage of the Hebrew 

people, employing that line of argument which 

ments of would be most persuasive unto that nation. 

His main object was to prove by citations from 

prophecy that Jesus of Nazareth had fulfilled every Messianic 

prediction of the Scriptures, and that therefore he was the 

true Messiah. Hence, in his genealogy of our Lord, he traces 

the royal descent from Abraham the progenitor of the Jewish 



Nativity of Jesus Christ. 51 

nation to prove that Jesus was a Jew, down through the Da- 
vidic line of Icings, holding that he was the King of kings, 
and King "of the kingdom of heaven." Matthew affirms 
that "Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea, in the days of 
Herod the king," 1 in fulfillment of the Scripture. He then 
proceeds to mention a number ef extraneous circumstances 
which group around the Nativity of Jesus, such as the ap- 
pearance of a strange Star, the visit of the "Wise Men, and the 
slaying of the male children by King Herod's order. 

Luke, on the other hand, was a Greek, and wrote his Gos- 
pel in the Greek language, in the special interest of the 
Greek-speaking Gentiles, relating how that Gabriel had been 
sent by God from heaven " to a virgin betrothed to a man 
named Joseph, of the house of David, and the virgin's name 
was Mary." 2 He notes those circumstances which led up to 
the birth of Jesus, such as the Roman census or enrollment of 
the population under the direction of Quirinius, which was 
conducted in the strictest Jewish method, which required that 
each household should repair to its own tribal territory to be 
registered. This accounts for the fact that Joseph and Mary 
came to the territory of Judah and to Bethlehem, their an- 
cestral village, for enrollment. Thence, with the instincts 
characteristic of an intelligent physician, Luke dwells more in 
detail than the other evangelists upon the physical aspects and 
incidents of the event; viz., the fulfillment of Mary's days, 
the bringing forth of her firstborn, wrapping the Child in 
swaddling clothes, and the circumstance, due probably less to 
the actual poverty of the family than to the crowded condi- 
tion of the village, "that they laid him in a manger he- 
cause there was no room for him in the innP He is also care- 
ful to mention that these things happened "in the days of 
Herod the king of Judaea." 3 As Luke wrote for the Gentiles, 
he neglects the Messianic argument, which was of special in- 
terest only to the Jews, and, in his genealogy of Jesus, traces 

1 Matt, ii, l. 2 Luke i, 26, 27. 3 Luke i, 5; Comp. ii, 1-5. 



52 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

his natural descent from Adam, the progenitor of the whole 
human race, cognizing Jesus as the Redeemer of all mankind. 

Mark, who bears a Koman name, and had traveled exten- 
sively in the Koman Empire, wrote at Rome for the special 
advantage of the Komans. His Gospel was intended as a 
report of Peter's sermons to those people, made at their re- 
quest. He omits all reference to the genealogy and birth of 
Jesus, the details of which would hardly be persuasive or ap- 
preciated by Roman readers. Accordingly he opens his Gos- 
pel at once by allusion to John the Baptist, and his witness to 
the activities of Christ's ministry, whose coming and pres- 
ence John stood forth to proclaim. 4 

Then the Apostle John, " that disciple whom Jesus loved," 
at a later period wrote his Gospel especially for the indoctrina- 
tion of the Christian Church. His object was to supplement 
the statements of the Synoptists' Gospels, supplying what 
they had omitted, and, wherever traversing the same ground, 
adding fresh details to their narratives, yet preserving, with 
the Synoptic Gospels, one central plan and unity of purpose. 
John's Gospel opens with the Godhead of Jesus Christ as the 
Word, devoting but a single sentence to his birth and incarna- 
tion: "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and 
we beheld His glory." 5 

The four Evangelists amply illustrate that principle of 
credibility which obtains in the courts: circumstantial vari- 
ation in the statement by witnesses evidences their substan- 
tial agreement and truth. These several writers had individ- 
uality of object in view in writing, with unity of design; and 
all were adapted to mankind in every age, country, and nation, 
having this one common end, viz. : " These things are written 

THAT YE MAY BELIEVE THAT JeSUS IS THE CHRIST, THE SON OF 

God, and that, believing, ye may have life in his name." 6 

* Mark i, 2-11. 6 j G hn i, 14. • John xx, 81. 



Nativity of Jesus Christ. 53 



CONFIRMATION. 

Attention may now be drawn to the testimony of the ad- 
versaries of the Christian religion for confirmatory witness 
respecting the statements in the Gospels on the 8 2 5. opinions 
Nativity of Jesus Christ. It is to be especially not Evidential, 
remarked that the personal opinions expressed by witnesses 
testifying are to be disregarded altogether. Mere opinions 
are not evidence, and can not be substituted for evidence. A 
heathen writer's belief does not prove a Christian fact, nor 
does his ^belief disprove it. It simply illustrates his mental 
attitude as a heathen toward Christ and Christianity. It is of 
no worth whatever in critical investigation. This is not say- 
ing, however, that concessions of fact and truth in the interests 
of history are to be set aside as being worthless in evidence. 
Upon the contrary, concessions made by an enemy are of vital 
and supreme importance in historical investigation, and con- 
clusive of any contention. Sometimes, in opposition to Chris- 
tianity, men have borne inadvertent witness to the truth by in- 
direction, and in such a manner as to contribute to and cor- 
roborate that which has been affirmed by the Evangelists. 
An involuntary testimony thus given comes with more force 
than when it is voluntary. Even the denial of a certain oc- 
currence conveys the implication that it had been affirmed by 
others as true, who possibly were in a better position to know 
the truth whereof they affirm than he who denies. For, why 
should denial be made at all of that which no one had ever 
claimed to be true, which had no existence in the conviction 
of others? Furthermore, the question affirmed and denied, if 
entitled to any consideration, related to something supposed 
to have existed in an earlier antiquity than when the denial 
was made. If, then, the adversaries, in denying, fail to refute 
the opposition, the validity of the conviction as based on truth 
on the part of the opposition stands, and legitimates the in- 
quiry whether the conviction is not founded on fact. And in 



54 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

the last analysis we are led back to inquire respecting the an- 
tiquity and authenticity of the JSTew Testament which founds 
the Christian faith on the special facts narrated in its con- 
tents. That is, the faith is based on Jesus Christ, of whom 
we could have no proper knowledge except from these Scrip- 
tures. 

WITNESS OF ENEMIES. 

' Since God is great and difficult to see, he put his own Spirit into 
his body that resembles ours, and sent it down to us, that we might be 
§26. Testi- enabled to hear him, and become acquainted with him." 
mony of "If God had wished to send down his Spirit from himself, 
Celsus. what need was there to breathe it into the womb of a 
woman?" "And, again, on account of Mary's pregnancy there came an 
Angel to the carpenter" (i. e., to Joseph). "The framers of the geneal- 
ogies, from feeling of pride, made Jesus to be descended from the first 
man, and from the kings of the Jews. . . . The carpenter's wife 
could not have been ignorant of the fact, had she been of such illustrious 
descent." 7 

The testimony of the Emperor Julian, coming as it does at 
a later date (A. D. 361), furnishes a transitional point between 
§27. witness "^ ne faith once delivered to the saints" in the 
of Julian, primitive Church succeeding the apostles, and 
that which has through all the centuries since held permanent 
place in Christian thought. Eeferring to the nativity of 
Jesus, Julian says : 

a) " Jesus whom you celebrate was one of Caesar's subjects. If you 
dispute it, I will prove it. . . . For yourselves allow that he was en- 
rolled with his father and mother in the time of Quirinius. But after he 
was born, what good did he do to his relations ? For it is said that they 
would not believe on him." " But Jesus having persuaded a few among 
you, and those the worst of men, has now been celebrated about three 
hundred years, having done nothing in his lifetime worthy of remem- 
brance," 8 etc. 

j8) " For neither is he of Judah, and how should he be so when, 
according to you [Christians], he was not born of Joseph, but of the Holy 
Ghost? When you reckon up the genealogy of Joseph, you carry it up to 
Judah ; but you have not been able to contrive this dexterously ; for 
Matthew and Luke have been shown to differ with one another about 
the genealogy." " Let this be said of God, though it is not ; for she was 

7 Origen contra Celsum, Bk. vi, 69, 73; v, 52; ii, 32. 

8 Citations from Cyril in Lard, vii, 626, 627. 



Nativity of Jesus Christ. 55 

not a virgin. . . . However, grant that this also is said of him: does 
he [i. e., the prophet], say that God should be born of a virgin? But 
you are continually calling Mary, Mother of God." 9 

The testimony of rabbinical works respecting the birth and 
incarnation of Jesus Christ is to the following effect : 

a) The Talmud says: "After the two thousand years of the Law, 
according to the decree, the Messiah ought to have come." " The right 
time for Messiah's advent is passed, and he is now be- §28. The Wit- 
lieved to have been born;" "the appointed times are nessofthe 
long since passed." "For the Messiah is born; his Jewish 
name is Menachem [Comforter]." "Messiah was born Rabbins, 
at the royal residence of Bethlehem of Judah." " Jesus of Nazareth was 
born in the year three thousand of creation, under the Emperor Augustus. 
From this time begin the years of the Nazarene." 10 "The Redeemer whom 
I will raise up among you shall not have a father, according to Zacha- 
riah." " The birth of the Messiah alone shall not be like that of any 
other creature." "The birth of Messiah alone shall be without defect 
[i. e., sinless]." " None shall know his Father before he tells it." 

j8) Toledoth Jeshu concedes : That Jesus was born of royal lineage, and 
of the tribe of Judah ; that he was the offspring of Joseph and Mary ; 
that he claimed to have been born of a virgin ; that his birth took place 
in Bethlehem of Judaea, under the political rulers named by the evangelists. 

Such is the witness of the enemies of Jesus respecting his 
birth. The character and position of these writers lend the 
greater weight to their testimony. Celsus, the 

& & J ' §29. Character 

conspicuous leader in the literary world of those of the wit- 



whose hostility led them to assail Christianity 
and hold in ridicule the faith of the Christians, is the first in 
order. Julian, as emperor of the Koman world, commands 
attention in that he carried with him all the dignity of his 
office and the force of his authority, based upon the archives 
of the government. The Eabbins, who wrote the Jewish Tal- 
mud, represented the greatest teachers of the Jewish Church, 
arrayed in open opposition to Jesus of Nazareth and his cause ; 
and the rabbinical writers of Toledoth Jeshu, who based their 
work on the Talmud, purporting to give, from the Jewish side 
of that period, a History of Jesus. These authors are men of 

9 76. 625, 629, Qsotokop 8e vfj.ei? otf irafeade ~M.apt.av KaKovvre^. 
10 Talmudic book called Generations. 



56 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

eminence, whose writings reflect the manifold opposition 
which arose against the Christian Church in those times. 
Keference is made to the expected Messiahship, and to the 
nativity of Jesus. This testimony may now be analyzed, 
and the facts elicited compared with those contained in the 
Gospels. 

A. As to Celsus. His witness relates to the incarnation, 
Joseph's dream, and the genealogies of Matthew and Luke. 

««« » , . a ) Living about a century after Christ's cruci- 

§30. Analysis J & J 

of the Testi- fixion, his testimony evidences by its opposition 
what had been the settled faith of the Christian 
Church from the beginning in respect to the incarnation of 
Jesus Christ. This tenet he ridicules in saying that "God 
put his Spirit into a body resembling ours, that we might 
become acquainted with him ;" and then demands to know, 
"What need was there to breathe into the womb of a 
woman?" 

p) Celsus confirms Matthew's account of the Angel's visit 
to Joseph in a dream respecting the chastity of his betrothed 
Mary when he says : "And again on account of Mary's preg- 
nancy, there came an Angel to the carpenter." 11 

y) He distinctly employs the plural number when he men- 
tions "the framers of the genealogies" as differing in their 
accounts of the ancestry of Joseph — Luke representing Christ's 
descent from Adam " the first man," 12 which was his natural 
line of descent; and Matthew "his illustrious descent" "from 
the kings of the Jews." 13 This discrimination is entirely cor- 
rect, and states exactly what was the object of each genealo- 
gist in his tracing Christ's ancestry at all. Now it should be 
remarked that Celsus must have had at that time in his pos- 
session a copy of these Gospels, to have this knowledge. The 
Gospels, therefore, were in existence within a century of the 
crucifixion. 

B. As to Julian. His testimon}^ relates to the enrollment 

" Matt, i, 18-21. 12 Luke ill, 23-38. " Matt, i, 1-17. 



Nativity of Jesus Christ. 57 

of Quirinius, the chronology of Christ's birth, and to his being 
born of a virgin. 

a) He affirms in a defiant tone, as that of one who felt 
entirely sure of his ground, that "Jesus was one of Caesar's 
subjects." He even challenges the denial of his proposition, 
and offers to prove it. He then attests that " Jesus was en- 
rolled with his father and mother in the time of Quirinius." 1 * 

/?) He dates the celebration (worship?) of Christ by the 
Christians, as "about three hundred years" before Julian's 
time. This chronological note is of great importance in de- 
termining "about" the time of Christ's nativity, proving its 
historicity in opposition to any possible mythical or legendary 
theory of Christ's life. 

y) Julian also introduces the discussion in dispute of the 
fact that Jesus was "born of a virgin;" 15 and he is indignant 
that the early Christians about him were " continually calling 
Mary, Mother of God." 

C. As to the Talmud. The Rabbins of this work declare a 
gradually increasing faith in Messiah's birth; that he ought to 
have been bom; that the time of his birth is now long past; 
that they believe that his birth has occurred ; and finally they 
affirm that it certainly did occur at Bethlehem. They also 
make allusions to his incarnation. 

a) Among other averments respecting Messiah they un- 
hesitatingly declare : " He ought to have come," " The right 
time for Messiah's advent is passed;" "The appointed times 
have long since passed;" "He is believed to have been born;" 
and " Messiah was born at the royal residence of Bethlehem of 
Judah." They also testify that "Jesus of Nazareth was born 
under the Emperor Augustus, from which time begin the years 
of the NazareneP 

/?) Of the incarnation they assert that "The Redeemer will 
not have a father;" that "the birth of the Messiah shall not" 

14 Gr. Kvpr/vLog-, Cyrenius; but in Latin, Quirinius, Luke ii, 1-7. 
tflsa. vii, 14; Matt, i, 23. 



58 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

be like that of other men; that it ''shall be without defect;" 
and that "none shall know the Father before he tells it." 

D. The Toledoth Jeshu refers specifically to Christ's line- 
age, his tribe, his mother and her virginity; and mentions 
definitely the place of his birth as Bethlehem in Judah, and 
cites the same political rulers as are recorded in the Gospels. 

§31. Reconfirmation. 

Brief corroborations from Ignatius of Antioch, one of the 
Apostolic Fathers; from Tertullian, of Carthage, Africa, one 
of the Apologists or Defenders of the Faith before the gov- 
ernment; and from one apostle of Jesus Christ, will sufficiently 
represent Christian teaching, and the main points which are 
substantiated by foregoing testimonies of the enemies of the 
Christian religion. 

a) Witness of Ignatius (110) : " Jesus Christ, who, after the flesh, was 
of David's race, who was the Son of God." 16 " He was truly of the race 
of David according to the flesh, but Son of God by the Divine will and 
power, truly born of a virgin." 17 

/?) Witness of Tertullian (200): "For it behooves Him to proceed 
from the tribe of Judah, and from Bethlehem." 18 

7) Witness of the Apostle Paul* (56-58) : " The Gospel of God . . . con- 
cerning his Son, who was born of the seed of David according to the 
flesh, who was declared to be the Son of God with power, . . . even Jesus 
Christ our Lord." 19 " Whose are the fathers, and of whom is Christ as 
concerning the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen." 20 
" But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth his Son, born of a 
woman, born under the law." 21 "God was in Christ reconciling the 
world unto himself." M " The first man is of the earth, earthy ; the sec- 
ond Man is of heaven."* 23 

A review of these testimonies is now in place. The witness 

of Celsus is first in order. From his mention of those who 

S32 Testimo- composed the "genealogies" it is obvious that he 

ny Examined, referred to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, 

which he must have had in his possession, as he could not 

possibly have had command of such tables by sheer oral tra- 

* 6 detirepo? dudpuiro? 6 Ktipio$ ii- ovpavov 
"Epis. to Ephesians, c.20. 18 Ans. to Jews, c.13. z°Ib. ix, 5. M 2 Cor. v, 19. 
» Ep. to Smyrneans, c. 1. ' 9 Rom. i, 1-4. 21 Gal. iv, 4. « 1 Cor. xv, 47. 



Nativity of Jesus Christ. 59 

dition. It may here be remarked in general, as will hereafter 
appear, that Celsus makes numerous references to facts and 
occurrences, as well as many citations from both the Gospels 
and Epistles, with such exactness that it compels the belief 
that he was in possession of a copy of the New Testament at 
that time ; accordingly, it is evident that these Scriptures must 
have been published a very considerable time before, that they 
should have fallen into the hands of enemies at such an early 
period. 

Celsus is clearly right in perceiving that Matthew's gene- 
alogy demonstrated Christ's descent " from the kings of the 
Jews," while Luke's made Jesus to have descended " from the 
first man;" but he was as clearly wrong in his inference that 
the difference meant a discrepancy in the two representations 
of Christ's ancestry. The lineage traced by Luke is that of 
the race ; the lineage traced by Matthew is that of royalty. 
Luke, therefore, gives the natural descent by parentage as 
seemingly taken from the family registry of births which each 
house was required to keep with strictness ; Matthew notes 
the actual succession of the kings from the throne of David, 
taken apparently from the records preserved in the public 
archives. If the natural descent ceased, as in the case of 
Jechonias, the line renewed itself through the nearest relative, 
who was also a royal descendant; for this was according to the 
express provision of Jewish law. 24 It is thus that Nathan, 
through Salathiel and Zerubbabel, appears in the genealogical 
line of Joseph. Now, Joseph and Mary were cousins, and the 
two lines are as much Mary's as they are Joseph's ; the differ- 
ence consisting not in the fact, but in its form of expression. 
" Females are named in genealogies when there is anything 
remarkable about them, or when any right or property is 
transmitted through them." * 



* Smith's Bible Dictionary, " Genealogy," and " Genealogy of Jesus." 
"Num. xxvii, 8-11. 



60 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

In respect to "the wedded maid and virgin mother" of our 
Lord, Celsus admits without dispute the nativity of Jesus at 
„~~ „. ^. , the accepted date as historical, that its occur- 

§33. His Birth r ' 

and incarna- rence was in a Jewish village, and that Joseph 
was a carpenter. These concessions, regarded by 
him as historical, authenticate the narrative of the Gospels. 
That certain other facts were claimed by Christian people as 
related to the birth of Jesus, his very contention demonstrates. 
Now, it is not to be presumed that Celsus sought to refute pos- 
tulates which had never been claimed, nor yet those events 
which occurred in times later than his own. He is content to 
deny the virginity of Mary, but reflects in unwarrantable 
terms upon her character and motherhood without the slight- 
est verification by facts or justification in right reasoning. 
This is in bad taste for one professing to be a philosopher. By 
implication here, and elsewhere by direct assertion, Celsus 
denies that Jesus was "the Son of God sent down from 
heaven." This, of course, was intended as a denial of the 
Christly incarnation. But his denial was obviously based 
upon his ignorance of the facts involved ; for how was it pos- 
sible for him to know anything whatever respecting Jesus 
being begotten* by the Holy Spirit % No man has a right to 
make denial on the ground of sheer ignorance. The case is 
simply inscrutable to human cognition. That, however, is no 
bar to a rational belief. We are constantly accepting facts in 
nature which transcend our scrutiny. We can not rationally 
account for the origin and unity of our conscience or moral 
nature with our thinking or intellectual nature. And if we 
can not explain the genesis and organization of our own men- 
tal constitution so as to render it intelligible to another, clearly 
we are debarred from demanding an explanation of the origin 
and conditions involved in the incarnation of Jesus Christ. 



* Tevpdu), applied to men, means to beget; to women, to give birth to. See Matt, 
i, 2, 16; Luke i, 13, 57, etc. 



Nativity of Jesus Christ. 61 

We can not rationally account for the fact that the acorn ger- 
minates and grows into an oak ; but we know it to be a fact. 
We do not have to believe how the grass grows, but we believe 
that it grows. No man can offer an explanation as to the gen- 
esis and unity into which our spirit and body enter before 
birth, and afterward are held in a continuous organization of 
life ; but that does not disprove that we now exist. In any strict 
sense, the incarnation does not lie within the scope of histor- 
ical investigation. In so far as from his sublime place and 
power in the world, to which Jesus Christ has been assigned 
in history, and in which he alone has illustrated the high 
character and claim of being the God-Man, to that extent, but 
no further, is the incarnation a legitimate subject for histor- 
ical study. 

In concluding this chapter the following particulars should 
be noted : 

1. Julian asserts and associates absolutely the enrollment 
of Quirinius with the birth of Jesus Christ, which he affirms 
occurred " about three hundred years" before his own time, 
these two circumstances fix the date of the beginning of the 
Christian era in accordance with the accepted Christian 
chronology. 

2. Both Celsus and Julian base their arguments on the gen- 
ealogies of Jesus as contained in the first and third Gospels. 
This evidences that the Gospels were written and published a 
considerable while before the time of either. Neither knows 
of any other account than that recorded in these Scriptures. 
The Gospels known to be spurious, which did not appear until 
the middle of the second century, are not cited by any adver- 
sary of Christianity as authoritative. 

3. Both these writers refer pointedly to the virginity of 
Mary; but, beyond expressing his personal opinion respect- 
ing the fact, neither undertakes to refute it, nor affirms that 
the account dates later than the time of the Nativity. This at 



62 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

least rescues the narrative from being a myth or legend which 
requires a long period of time for accretions, and then finding 
credence. 

4. The Talmud concedes that the time for Messiah's birth 
is long since past, but affirms that it certainly occurred at 
Bethlehem ; alleging, also, that Jesus of Nazareth was born in 
the reign of Augustus Ca3sar. To an investigator it is easy to 
see that Jesus Christ was the Messiah of the Jews, and that 
his birth is correctly ascribed to the time of Augustus as in the 
Gospel. 

5. The Toledoth Jeshu also designates Bethlehem as the 
place of Christ's birth, declaring his royal lineage from David, 
his proper tribe of Judah, and the rulers of the country as men- 
tioned in the Gospels. 

6. As reconfirmation, Ignatius of Syria reiterates the Chris- 
tian claim that Jesus was descended from David and was born 
of a virgin ; and Tertullian attests the place of his birth was 
Bethlehem ; and, finally, Paul announces Jesus as " the seed 
of David according to the flesh," who was declared to be " the 
Son of God with power ... by the resurrection from the 
dead." 



CHAPTER III. 

CIBCUMSTANCES COJSTCUKEEISrT WITH THE 
NATIVITY. 

I. Joseph's Flight into Egypt. 
II. Herod's Massacre at Bethlehem. 

III. Wise Men and the Star of the East. 

IV. Herod's Death and an Eclipse. 

V. Registration of Cyrenius (Quirinius). 



Chapter III. 

CIRCUMSTANCES CONCUKKENT WITH THE 
NATIVITY. 

§ 34. Sources : Biographical Epitomes of Witnesses, and Literature. 

1. Justin Martyr (110-165), the proper name of whom was Flavius 
Justin, the surname having reference to the mode of his death. 
Tertullian was the first to designate him " Philosopher and Martyr." 
(Against the Valentinians , c. 5.) He was of Greek origin and educa- 
tion, although born in Shechem, Central Palestine. In youth he 
traveled extensively, being in great spiritual unrest, and sought 
consolation in different schools of Philosophy — the Stoical system, 
Peripatetic, and the Platonic — but neither of these supplied the 
cravings of his spirit. One day, while walking along the seaside, 
he met a venerable man of benignant countenance, with whom he 
had very earnest conversation about his unsatisfied consciousness. 
The stranger counseled him to study the Hebrew prophets. He 
did so, continuing his investigations in the Gospels as to the fulfill- 
ment of prophecy. He became converted before the year 133. 
Thenceforth he devoted himself to the diligent study and teaching 
of Christian doctrines. He acquired great scholarship in the 
Scriptures, but continued to wear his philosopher's garb to indicate 
that now he had become possessor of the true philosophy of life. 

" Justin forms the transition from the Apostolic Fathers, prop- 
erly so called." (Schaff.) Eusebius remarks of Justin: "A 
genuine lover of true philosophy, in the gown of a philosopher, he 
proclaimed the Divine Word and defended the faith by his 
writings." (B. iv, c. 11.) Much is said of his genius, learning and 
faithfulness in his Christian activities, for he was an evangelist 
missionary. " He lived at a time when the profession of Christ 
was a crime under the Roman law against secret societies and pro- 
hibited religions." (Schaff.) Justin stood with fearless courage 
for the cause of truth when it was most fiercely assailed by 
violence, and finally attested his faith as a confessor and martyr 
for Christ. The testimony of Eusebius and most credible histo- 
rians renders it nearly certain that he suffered martyrdom in the 
reign of Marcus Aurelius, who reigned 161-180. The Chronicon 
Paschale gives as the date of his death A. D. 165. (Ante-Nicene 
Fathers, 1, 160.) He was first scourged, and then beheaded, under 
the order of Rusticus, the prefect of Rome. 

65 



66 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

The principal works of Justin are his two Apologies, addressed 
to the emperors and the Roman Senate, and his famous Dialogue 
with Trypho the Jew whom Justin sought to convert to the Chris- 
tian faith. " Eusebius mentions two Apologies ; one written in the 
reign of Antoninus Pius, the other in the reign of Marcus 
Aurelius." (Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. I, 161, Am. ed.) 

2. Iren^us (120-202) was probably born at Smyrna, Asia Minor. He was 

a disciple of Poly carp, and the " spirit of his preceptor passed over 
him." His philosophical genius, practical common sense, and his 
Greek learning combined to make him a remarkable man in the 
early Church. He was almost within touch of the Fountainhead 
of Christianity, through his teacher Polycarp, and his grand 
teacher the apostle John. He was both the leading representative 
and champion of orthodoxy in the Church of his day, as well 
as the mediator between the Eastern and Western Churches. 
Irenaeus succeeded to the episcopacy at Lyons, France, after the 
defeat of Ponthinius in A. D. 178. He disappears from sight about 
190, but whether he died a natural death is now unknown. A very 
remarkable fact is, that he alludes to or cites every writing of the 
evangelists and apostles except Philemon, and the third Epistle of 
John. He wrote Against Heresies, some fragments of which 
remain. 

3. Alfred Edersheim, A. M., D. D., Ph. D., the learned author of the 

Life and Time of Jesus the Messiah (2 vols., 2d ed., Oxford, 1884) ; and 
Prophecy and History in Relation to the Messiah (New York, 1885). 
The writer is said to have been thoroughly educated in all Tal- 
mudic literature for a Jewish Eabbi, but became a Christian and a 
specialist on the subjects cited. His eminence makes him an 
authority on the line of Messianic argument. 

§ 35. Accompaniments of the Nativity. 

And the Gentiles shall come to thy Light, and kings to the brightness of 
thy rising. The multitude of camels shall cover thee, and the 
dromedaries of Midian and Ephah ; all they from Sheba shall 
come ; they shall bring gold and incense, and they shall show forth 
the praises of the Lord. — Isaiah. 

I shall see him, but not now; I shall behold him, but not nigh. There 
shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Scepter shall arise out of 
Israel. — Balaam. 

Messiah himself shall appear in the north, and his advent will be marked 
by a star. Jesus of Nazareth was born under the Emperor Augus- 
tus. From this time begin the years of the Nazarene. — Talmud. 

Where is he that is born King of the Jews ? for we saw his star in the 
east, and are come to worship him. — The Magi. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 67 

If he be not the Messiah, there has been at least none other before or 
after him. If he be not the Messiah, the world has not, and never 
can have, a Messiah. — Edersheim. 

ARGUMENT. 

Ten notable facts, each an occurrence of historical interest in itself, 
concenter in the birth and infancy of " the Holy Child Jesus." It 
is a significant circumstance that the case of Christ has no parallel 
in history. The angelic admonition respecting Mary, the flight 
and return of the family, the star of the east which awakened 
such profound interest in distant peoples, the visit of the Wise 
Men to the infant Jesus, the gifts and worship of the Magi, the 
massacre of the male children at Bethlehem, the motive of King 
Herod in this slaughter, the timely death of this infamous ruler, 
— are not a meaningless record of the sacred text. All these and 
other particulars are narrated by but one Evangelist. Neverthe- 
less, every circumstance finds ample confirmation in profane 
writings: traditional, rabbinical, heathen, patristic, and apostolic. 
To these concurrent circumstances of the Nativity there re- 
mains to be added the witness of several writers of fame respect- 
ing the time and place of its occurrence, with special reference to 
the first enrollment or census of population made under Quirinius 
at Bethlehem, which fixes the beginning of the Christian Era. 
This is attested by the imperial Julian, by Christian apologists, 
by the testimony of two Eomans of great distinction, and by 
monumental testimony and inscriptions at Rome. These sources 
of early literature legitimate the induction that the narratives of 
Matthew and Luke are both ancient and authentic. 

1. A Group of Concurrent Circumstances connected with the Birth of 

Jesus. 

2. An Astronomical Argument based on the Moon's Eclipse at Herod's 

Death. 

3. An Argument from Science founded on the Conjunction of Several 

Planets. 

4. The Chronology and Locality of Christ's Birth as related to Quirinius. 

JOSEPH'S FAMILY AND EGYPT. 

Circumstances of an interesting character § 36 . Joseph 
group about the Nativity of Jesus. Each histor- and Family. 
ical fact has a significant bearing upon the central event. 
M-atthe w narrates these particulars : 

" Behold an angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, say- 
ing, Arise and take the young Child and his mother and flee into Egypt, 
and be thou there until I tell thee ; for Herod will seek the young Child 



68 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

to destroy him. . . .' But when Herod was dead, behold an angel of 
the Lord appeareth in a dream to Joseph in Egypt saying, Arise and take 
the young Child and his mother and go into the land of Israel, for they 
are dead that sought the young Child's life. And he arose and took the 
young Child and his mother and came into the land of Israel." * 

CONFIRMATION. 

Celsus admits three main facts respecting Jesus, the flight, 
stay in, and the return from Egypt, besides the offices of the 
angel ; but his reference to Mary's condition as the occasion 
for fleeing, and the assumption that Jesus remained in Egypt 
until grown up, and hired out as a servant because of poverty, 
are as unhistorical as they are gratuitous. He says: 

"And again on account of the pregnancy of Mary, there came an angel 
to the carpenter, and once more an angel, in order that they might take 
up the young Child and flee away" 2 [into Egypt]. "What need was 
there that you, while still an infant, should be conveyed into Egypt? 
Was it to escape being murdered? But, then, it was not likely that God 
should be afraid of death: and yet an angel came down from heaven 
commanding you and your friends to flee, lest you should be captured, 
and be put to death. And was not the great God who had already sent 
two angels on your account, able to keep you, his only Son, in safety?" 3 
" Having hired himself out as a servant in Egypt on account of his pov- 
erty, and having there acquired some miraculous powers on which the 
Egyptians pride themselves, he returned to his own country, elated on 
account of them, and by means of these proclaimed himself a God." 4 

THE CHILDREN OP BETHLEHEM. 

§37. slaying Kespecting the massacre of the children of 
of the infants. Bethlehem, the first Gospel contains the record 

of the fact which occasioned the flight of Joseph and his 

family into Egypt : 

" Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the Wise Men, 
was exceeding wroth, and sent forth and slew all the male children that 
there were in Bethlehem, and in all the borders thereof, from two 
years old and under, according to the time which he had carefully 
learned of the Wise Men." 6 



i Matt, ii, 13, 19, 20, 21. 2 Origen contra Celsum, V. 52. 3 jj>. i, 66. * lb. I, 28. 
6Matt.il, 16. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 69 

a) Celsus says: 

" Chaldseans are spoken of by Jesus as having been induced to come 
to him at his birth and to worship him as a God while yet an infant ; and 
to have made this known to Herod the tetrarch ; and that the latter sent 
and slew all the infants that had been born about the same time, thinking 
that in this way he would insure his death among the others ; and that 
he was led to do this through fear that, if Jesus lived to sufficient age, 
he would obtain the throne."* " But if this was done in order that you 
might not reign in his stead, when you had grown up to man's estate, 
why, after you did reach that estate, do you not become a king, instead 
of you the Son of God, wandering about in so mean a condition, hiding 
yourself through fear, and leading a miserable life up and down?" 6 

/3) Macro bius, a rhetorician (A. D. 110), records a joke 
perpetrated by the Emperor Augustus upon receiving infor- 
mation, at the same time, that Herod had slain his own son, 
Antipater, near the same time that he slew the children of 
Bethlehem : 

" When he heard that, among the male children within two years of 
age which Herod the king of the Jews commanded to be slain in Syria, 
his own son had been killed, he said : ' It is better to be Herod's hog than 
to be his son.'" 7 

y) The Toledoth Jeshu says : 

"And the king [Herod the Great] gave orders for putting to death 
every infant to be found in Bethlehem, and the king's messengers killed 
every infant according to the royal order." 



*lt is not within the purpose of this work on Historical Evidences to under- 
take to refute the adversaries of Christianity so much as to gather concessions 
and facts from their writings to substantiate the statements in the historical New 
Testament. Nevertheless, the utterly uncritical character of Celsus, in these 
criticisms and strictures upon these Sacred Writings, should not go wholly unex- 
posed. This champion of literary opposition to Christ and Christianity has here 
compacted into a single sentence no less than four gross misstatements in matters 
of fact, professedly taken from the Gospels themselves: 1. Jesus did not say one 
word about the Wise Men coming to Christ's birth, but Matthew makes a different 
statement. 2. The Chaldseans are not mentioned at all in any of the four Gospels, 
but the Magi (Mdyot.). 3. There was no '■'■Herod the tetrarch, " in existence when Jesus 
was born; it was "Herod the king." 4. The king did not order slain "all the 
infants born about the same time," but all the male infants: aveiXep iravrag- rod? 
ircudag- (Matt, ii, 16). 

6 Origen contra Celsum, I, 58, 61. 7 " Melius est Herodis porcum esse quam 

fllium" {Saturnalia, Convivia, ii, 4). Some suppose a play on the words 'v? sow, 
and vi6g- son. 'uf, however, is both masculine and feminine gender. 



70 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

"When the royal power was conferred on the Maccabees 

in the person of Simon, it was with cm express reservation of the 

§38. Herod's r ^9^ s of the Messiah" But this royal criminal, 

crimes. wno na d killed Hyrcanus his favorite wife's grand- 
father, Mariamne herself, and their two sons, Alexander and 
Aristobulus, thereby extinguishing the priestly and royal 
house of the Asmonean race or the Maccabees, the last and 
rightful contestants to the throne; who did not hesitate to 
destroy whole families supposed to be in opposition to his 
wishes; who ordered all the nobles of the land to assemble 
when on his death-bed, then shut them up in the hippodrome 8 
with orders that, immediately after he had died, these nobles 
should be massacred, in order that his own funeral might at least 
appear to be the occasion for universal sorrow instead of univer- 
sal joy and gladness, as he seems to have consciously appre- 
hended would be deserved in his case, — why should it ever 
have been thought to be incredible that such a royal wretch 
would slaughter a dozen children at Bethlehem, if thereby he 
might place beyond recall the heir apparent to the throne of 
Israel? In his passionate jealousy, Herod sought to destroy 
the predicted King of the kingdom. The infant Jesus occupy- 
ing a manger in a stable, is an object of terror to the ruling 
Herod ! 

As Lange justly remarks: 

"The Jews and priests were pleased that Simon should be governor 
until there should arise a Faithful Prophet." Certain measures relating 
to the temple were adopted temporarily " until there should come a 
Prophet to show them what should be done." " While the Asmoneans 
[Maccabees] enjoyed the royal dignity, with the express acknowledg- 
ment that the scepter belonged to the coming Prophet, Herod [himself J 
recognized no such expected Messiah, or, rather, entertained only super- 
stitious fears about him, and cherished the desire of effecting his destruc- 
tion." " It is noteworthy that the same Herod who had already extinguished 
the priestly and royal house of the Maccabees, by the murder of the last heirs, 
also attempted to destroy the true and eternal Royalty of the House of David" 9 
by the same means. 



t Joseph. Ant. xvii, 6, 5. 9 Commentary on Matt, ii 1; cf.l Macc.xiv,41; lv, 46. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 71 



THE WISE MEN AND THE STAR. 

"The Star in the East" was the remarkable sign given in 
fulfillment of the famous prediction of Balaam, the Moses of 
the Midianites: "I shall see him, but not now; §39. The Magi 
I shall behold him, but not nigh. There shall come and the star. 
a Star out of Jacob, and a Scepter shall arise out of Israel. Out 
of Jacob shall He come that shall home dominion" 10 Matthew 
is the only Evangelist who notes the mission of the Magi who 
had crossed streams, mountains, and deserts guided by the pres- 
ence of a single star to the feet of the infant Jesus. They ask 
Herod, " Where is he that is born King of the Jews, for we saw 
his star in the east, and are come to worship himV n Dr. Philip 
Schaff remarks : 

"The Savior was not without witness amongst the heathen. 'Wise 
men from the East' — that is, Persian Magi of the Zend religion, in which 
the idea of a Zoziosh or Redeemer was clearly known — guided miraculously 
by a star or meteor created for the purpose, came and sought out the 
Savior to pay him homage. . . . We must suppose that God saw good 
to speak to the Magi in their own way ; they were seeking light from the 
study of the stars, whence only physical light could be found ; and he 
guided them to the Source of spiritual light, to the cradle of his Son, by 
a star made to appear to them, and to speak intelligibly to them through 
their preconceptions." 12 

An Oriental writer relates the following in- 

teresting tradition as having been the address tionai 

made by the Magi to King Herod on the occasion es imony * 

of their visit to Jerusalem, and their inquiry, " Where is he that 

is born King of the Jews?" 

a) "A certain person of great note among us, in a book which he 
composed, warned us in it mentioning these things : A child that shall 
descend from heaven will be born in Palestine whom the greatest part of 
the world shall serve ; and the sign of his appearance shall be this : Ye 
shall see a strange star which shall direct you where he is ; when ye see 
this, take gold, myrrh, and frankincense and go offer them to him and 
worship him ; and then return, lest a greater calamity befall you. Now 
the star has appeared to us, and we have come to perform what he has 
commanded us." 13 



™ Num. xxiv, 17, 19. « Matt, ii, 1, 2. ™ Smith's Bib. Dict.,Vol. II, p. 1349, Am. ed. 
13 Rabbi Frey's Messiah, 138, citing Abulyshrag, Hist. Dynasty, p. 70. 



72 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ft) The Nestorians claim that Zoroaster was a disciple of 

one of the Jewish Prophets. 

" The intercommunication of opinions between the Jewish and Zoro- 
astrian religions throws great light on the visit of the Magi or Wise Men 
at Jerusalem . . . who had come more immediately in contact with 
the Babylonian Jews." 14 "Now this Zoroaster appears to have been a 
Jew both by birth and religion, and servant to one of the Prophets of 
Israel, and well versed in the sacred writings, and therefore may well be 
supposed to have learned all this from the prophecy of Balaam/' 15 

The late Dr. Nehemiah Adams, in mentioning that the Nes- 

torians "are confident of the truth of the general belief that 

Oroomiah was the residence of the renowned Zoroaster," says : 

"As their tradition is remarkably corroborated by Abulpharagius, I 
will quote his language: ' Zeradusht [Zoroaster], the preceptor of the 
Magi, taught the Persians concerning the manifestation of Christ, and 
ordered them to bring gifts to him in token of their reverence and sub- 
mission. He declared that in the latter day a pure virgin should conceive, 
and as soon as the child was born a star would appear, blazing even at 
noonday with undiminished luster. You, my sons, exclaimed the ven- 
erable seer, will perceive its rising before any other nation. As soon, 
therefore, as you shall see the star, follow it whithersoever it shall lead 
you. He is the Almighty Word who created the heavens/ " 16 

y) A Platonic philosopher named Caludius, who was not a 

Christian, says: 

"There is also a venerable and sacred history which speaks of the 
rising of a certain unusual star, not foretelling disease and death, but the 
descent of a venerable God, born for the sake of human conversation 
[i. e., conduct, life] and the affairs of mortals; which star truly, when 
the wise men of the Chaldseans saw in their journey by night, and being 
very expert in their considerations of celestial things, are said to have 
inquired after the birth of the new Deity, and having found the infant 
Majesty, to worship him and pay their vows worthy of such a God." 17 

WITNESS OP ENEMIES, 
a) Talmud: "Messiah himself shall appear in the North, and his ad- 
vent will be marked by a Star." 18 "When Messiah shall be revealed, 
there shall rise up in the East a certain star flaming with 

§4 Testoo? iCal Six SOrtS ° f colors -" 19 " The star sha11 shine forth from 
the East, and this is the star of the Messiah. It shall 

shine forth from the East for fifteen days, and if it be prolonged it will 

14 Milman's Hist. Christianity, I, 114. 

16 R. Frey's Messiah, 138, cornp. Prideaux' Connections, I, 207, 208, Part i, Bk. Iv. 

16 Friends of Christ, 31. 

17 Cited in Frey's Messiah, 138, from Fabricius's Bibliotheca Latin., 142-146. 

18 Schottgen, Horoz Hebraicw et Talmudica?, 538, 531. 19 Frey's Messiah^ 137. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 73 

be for the good of Israel." 20 "The King Messiah shall be revealed in the 
land of Galilee ; and lo, a star in the East shall swallow up seven stars of the 
North, and a flame of red fire shall be in the firmament for six days." 21 

/?) Those Jews who are still looking for the Messiah to 
come, confidently expect a star to appear as the sign of his 
advent. It was also so in the early Christian centuries ; a fact 
which explains why that Messianic impostor succeeded so well in 
the reign of Hadrian,* who assumed the name Bar-Kokheba — 
i. e. 9 the son of a star — and issued coins hearing a star, in allu- 
sion to Balaam's prediction. In his open rebellion against the 
Komans he effected a large following from the Jews, and, when 
captured, he proposed that if the Komans should kill him he 
would prove his Messiahship by rising from the dead! The 
Komans took him at his word, and cut off his head. As the 
impostor did not rise from the dead, the Jews in disgust named 
him Bar-Kozibar; i. e., the son of a lie!® 

Origen, in reply to Celsus, says : 

"In the next place he [Celsus] runs away to what immediately fol- 
lows the narrative of the birth of Jesus — the account of the star and of the 
Wise Men who came from the East to worship the Child." 
" He makes numerous quotations from the Gospel accord- § ^'-iS 8138 
ing to Matthew, as the star that appeared at the birth of 
Christ." "I know not, moreover, why he has passed by in silence the 
cause which led the Magi to come, and why he has not stated, according to 
the Scriptural account, that it was a star seen by them in the east." 23 

WITNESS OF FRIENDS. 

a) Irenaeus refers to the Magi, their adoration §43. patristic 
and their gifts to the Child, f and their return Testimony, 
home by way of the Assyrians. 24 

*A.D. 117-138. 

+ " The adoration of the Magi is a favorite part of the picture of the Holy- 
Family. . . . Mary sits holding the babe in her lap, and receiving the homage 
of the Magi. ... In later pictures the star is added." (Schaff, Hist. Christian 
Church, II, 282, 283.) The picture taken from the Catacombs is supposed to date as 
early as the third, if not the second century. The Romanists claim that the ado- 
ration of Mary must have antedated the picture. But what justification is there 
that Mary is the adored one at all? The presence of the mother with her Child is 
indispensably natural, if not necessary, as otherwise the suggestiveness would 
be lost. How could the young and dependent Child appear alone? It is clearly 
intended to represent Matthew's account how that the Magi " came into the house 
and saw the young Child and his mother, [and} they fell down and worshiped 
HIM "—not the mother. (Matt, ii, 2, 8, 11.) 

20 Edersheim's Jesus of Nazareth, I, 212. 21 Frey's Messiah, 137. 

» Schaff, Ch. Hist., 1, 402. 23 Qrig. cont. Cels., 1, 40, 34, 58. 24 Heresies, B. iii, c. 16, 4. 



74 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

/?) Justin Martyr mentions the Magi coming from Herod ; 
also the star in the heavens, and, learning from the Jewish 
elders where Christ should be born, they " came to Bethlehem 
and worshiped the Child, and presented him with gold, frank- 
incense, and myrrh, and then returned not to Herod." s 

y) Tertullian refers to the Magi as astrologers from the 
East ; that " the interpreters of the stars were the first to an- 
nounce Christ's birth, the first to offer him gifts, . . . 
frankincense, and myrrh, and gold, . . . the close of 
worldly sacrifice, and the glory which Christ was about to do 
away." He also mentions that the Magi returned home by 
another way. * 

ARGUMENTS FROM SCIENCE. 

a) There is much force, if not absolute conclusiveness in 
verification of Matthew's account of the wonderful star, in 
§ 44. Tradition the modern discovery of astronomy. It is to be 
and science. no t e d that the learned Jewish Rabbi, named Ar- 
barbanel (or, properly, AbrabaneV), in his Commentary on 
Daniel entitled Wells of Salvation, published in 1547, men- 
tions the tradition of the Jews that there was a conspicuous 
conjunction of planets which occurred three years before the 
birth of Moses, in the sign Pisces; and that another conjunc- 
tion would occur before the Messiah's birth. As this did hap- 
pen in A. D. 1463, when Abrabanel was living, he was confi- 
dent that the circumstances indicated the near approach of 
Messiah's advent, so that he requested the astronomers to in- 
vestigate this subject. "Ideler and Wieseler conjecture that 
this astronomical belief existed among the Jews already at 
the time of Christ."* 

ft) Abrabanel's publication of the Jewish tradition was 

At "^ty years prior to the discovery of the great 

omers' conciu- Kepler, published in 1606-1614, which was a 

conjunction of the planets Jupiter and Saturn, 

with Mars added later, and occurred repeatedly in A. U. 747 

26 Dialogue with Trypho, 78. 26 idolatries c, ix. 27 Schaff, Ch . Hist. 1, 115, n. 2. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 75 

and 748, in the sign Pisces. Kepler's calculation has been 
corroborated by several eminent astronomers in independent 
investigations — including Schubert's of Petersburg, Charles 
Pritchard's of London, honorable secretary of the Koyal As- 
tronomical Society, and Ideler's and Encke's of Berlin. 
Pritchard affirms the fact of the conjunction to be " as certain 
as any astronomical phenomenon of ancient date;" 28 Ideler in- 
sists that " the star of astrology has become the torch of chro- 
nology." a Schaff adds : " It certainly makes the pilgrimage 
of the Magi to Jerusalem and Bethlehem more intelligible." *° 
Pritchard says: 

11 To complete the fascination of the tale, about an hour and a half 
after sunset the two planets [Jupiter and Saturn] might be seen from 
Jerusalem, hanging as it were in the meridian, and suspended over 
Bethlehem in the distance. These celestial phenomena thus described 
are, it will be seen, beyond the reach of question; and at first impres- 
sion they assuredly appear to fulfill the conditions of the Star of the 
Magi." 31 

Dr. Edersheim states that — 

11 In the astronomical tables of the Chinese — to whose general trust- 
worthiness so high an authority as Humboldt bears testimony — the 
appearance of an evanescent star was noted. Pingre* and others have 
designated it as a comet, and calculated its first appearance in February, 
in 750 A. U. C, which was just the time when the Magi would, in all 
probability, leave Jerusalem, since this must have preceded the death 
of Herod, which took place in March, 750. Moreover, it has been astro- 
nomically ascertained that such a sidereal apparition would be visible 
to those who left Jerusalem, and that it would point — seem almost to 
go before — in the direction of, and stand over, Bethlehem. Such, im- 
partially stated, are the facts of the case ; and here the subject must, 
in the present state of our information, be left." 32 

7) "If we accept the result of these calculations of the astronomers, 
we are brought to within two years of the year of the Na- 
tivity, namely, between A. U. 748 (Kepler), and 750 induction. S 
(Wieseler) . The difference arises, of course, from the un- 
certainty of the time of the departure, and the length of the journey of 
the Magi."" 



»See Schaff, Ch. Hist. I, 115. 29 7&. I, 116. *> Id. I, 116. ^Ib. I, 118, 119. 

** Jesus the Messiah, I, 213. 33 Schaff, Ch. Hist. 1, 116. 



76 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



KING HEROD'S DEATH. 

It is obvious that Herod the Great was living when Christ 

was born, from the circumstance that he sought "the young 

§47. Moon's Child to destroy him." Exactly when King 

Eclipse. Herod died is astronomically ascertained, and 
the event occurred, probably within a few months after the 
Nativity. His death took place just before the time of the 
Jewish Passover, in the city of Jericho, in the valley of the 
Jordan, on the 13th of March A. IT. 750, or, according to our 
common chronology, in B. C. 4. Josephus has noted a cir- 
cumstance which affords a datum for a scientific investigation, 
in saying, " That very night there was an eclipse of the moon;" M 
and what renders the fact the more conspicuous is, that this is 
the only eclipse mentioned by this historian. Now, if the 
Star of the East was the product of the conjunction of the 
planets Jupiter, Saturn, and Mars in A. H. 748 as held by 
Kepler, then Jesus was born six years before the current 
Christian era ; but if, on the other hand, the star was identical 
with the comet of 750, as claimed by Pingre, then Jesus was 
born B. C. 4. Nevertheless, "Wieseler, who is in agreement 
with Kepler as to the conjunction of the planets, places the 
date of that event at A. U. 750, or coincident with the year 
in which Herod died, B. C. 4 ; the discrepancy between Kep- 
ler and Wieseler being due to the uncertain time when the 
Magi started upon their journey, and the length of the route. 
By all accounts, therefore, Christ was crucified, not in A. D. 33, 
as is generally supposed, but in A. D. 29. 

In respect to the era of Christianity, Dr. Edward Robinson 
says: 

"The present Christian era which was fixed by the abbot Dionysius 
Exiguus in the sixth century, assumes the year of the Christian era as 

coincident with the year 754 from the building of Rome. 

8 48 The 

Christian Era ^ ur era l )e S ms m anv case more than four years too late ; 

i. e., from four to five years after the actual birth of 

Christ. This era was first used in historical works by the Venerable 



' Ant. xvii, 6, 4. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 77 

Bede early in the sixth century, and was not long after introduced in 
public transactions by the French kings, Pepin and Charlemagne." 35 

This does not mean that the monk Exiguus invented the 
Christian era, but he computed it. Considering the data at 
his command at that time, his work is as remarkable for its 
difficulty as for its measure of success. 

ENROLLMENTS UNDER QUIRINIUS. 

Luke's statement furnishes another datum for aj ,„ n 

§49. Registra- 

determining the time of Christ's birth. In his tion of 

particularizations, for which he is so remarkable, uirmius ' 

he introduces the enrollment of Quirinius as a concurrent 

event with the Nativity. He says : 

"Now it came to pass in those days, there went out a decree from 
Caesar Augustus that all the world should be enrolled. This was the 
first enrollment made when Quirinius 36 was governor of Syria. And all 
went to enroll themselves, every one to his own city. And Joseph also 
went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea to the 
city of David which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house 
and family of David, to enroll himself with Mary, who was betrothed to 
him, being great with child. And it came to pass while they were there, 
the days were fulfilled that she should be delivered ; and she brought 
forth her firstborn son." 37 

In making this historical statement respecting Quirinius, 
as an incident to that fact, the Evangelist introduces the itin- 
erary of Joseph and Mary from Nazareth to Bethlehem, and 
the occasion which explains that movement. It was precisely 
this enrollment and the mode of its procedure — a circumstance 
so incidentally mentioned as related to Christ's birth and so 
significant in itself — which brought these persons from their 
quiet homes in the North, to their ancestral village, and into 
the tribal territory of Judaea, in exact circumstantial fulfill- 
ment of prophecy, "in the city where David dwelt." Micah's 
prediction was: 

"But thou Bethlehem Ephrathah, which art little to be among the 
thousands of Judah, out of thee shall One come forth unto me, that is to be 
Ruler in Israel, whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting. 5 ' 38 

35 Robinson's Greek Harmony of the Gospels. 86 "Cyrenius " is derived from 

the Greek Kvp^viog- , but " Quirinius " was his proper Roman name. 
87 Luke's Gospel, ii, 1-7. & Micah, v, 2. 



78 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

A census of the population was to be taken in Palestine as 
in "all the [Roman] world," but the Evangelist nowhere af- 
firms or implies that the enrollment was to be conducted by 
any Roman officer, much less under the personal supervision 
of Quirinius. Luke simply employs the enrollment to give a 
general historical date to the Nativity : " When Quirinius was 
governor of Syria." Quirinius was a man of remarkable ad- 
ministrative and military abilities. He had subdued the 
hardy mountaineers of Cilicia, and had accorded to him the 
honors of a Roman triumph as a great general. Having now 
been engaged so successfully in military service in the East, 
he appears to have been appointed special commissioner to en- 
roll the Jewish nation as the subjects of Caesar's government 
when Jesus was born. Accordingly, he was known as " Gov- 
ernor of Syria," 39 a term employed to express the title being 
very broad, and here understood in its broadest sense as in- 
cluding the commission extraordinary, as the legatus of Caesar. 
Quirinius died in Rome, A. D. 21. 

W. M. Ramsay, who is one of the latest authorities on the 
historical New Testament, observes : 

" The decree of Augustus which Luke mentions is commonly inter- 
preted as ordering that a single census should be held of the whole 
Eoman world. This is not a correct interpretation of Luke's words. He 
uses the present tense, and he means that Augustus ordered enrollments 
to be regularly taken, according to the strict and proper usage of the 
present tense. What Augustus did was to lay down the principle of sys- 
tematic enrollment in the Eoman world, not to arrange for the taking 
of one single census." 40 

While, in compliance with imperial requirement, this was 
to be a Roman registration, it was to be conducted distinc. 
§50. Method tively by the Jewish method. It was a reserva- 
of Registration. ^ on mac i e j n the original compact when the Jews 
became a dependency on the empire, that they were to exer- 
cise the sovereign right to manage their internal affairs in ac- 

39 "Hyefioiv, leader, guide, prefect, president, governor of a Roman province. 
« " Was Christ born in Bethlehem?" c. vi, 123, 124. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 79 

cordance with their own laws and religion. 41 It is easy to see, 
therefore, why every person was expected to register in his 
own tribal territory, and in his own native city. 

" Owing to the care with which the Jews preserved their family rec- 
ords and pedigrees, all true Jews would know what was their family and 
their proper city according to the ancient tribal system, even though 
they might have been forced by circumstances to change their abode. 
This seems to have suggested the mode of enrollment which Luke de- 
scribes — a mode which would mark off, by a broad clear line, the true 
Jews from the mongrel population of Palestine. All who claimed to be 
Jews were to repair to the proper city of their tribe and family. The 
rest of the population, who were probably much more numerous, would 
be counted according to their ordinary residence."*' 

On this point Dr. Edersheim remarks : 

" In consequence of the decree of Caesar Augustus, Herod directed a 
general registration to be made after the Jewish rather than the Roman 
manner. . . . All country people were to be registered in their own city, 
meaning thereby the town to which the village or place where they were 
born was attached. In so doing, 'the house or lineage* was marked. 
According to the Jewish mode of registration, the people would have to 
be enrolled according to their tribes, families, or clans, and the house of 
their fathers. ... In the case of Joseph and Mary, whose descent from 
David was not only known, but where, for the sake of the unborn Mes- 
siah, it was most important that this should be distinctly noted, it is 
natural that, in accordance with Jewish law, they should go to Beth- 
lehem." « 

Among the last words which are most valuable touching 
this enrollment at the time of the Nativity, is that given by 
the eminent Augustus W. Zumpt, a nephew of the § 51 , Zumpt . s 
celebrated classical scholar of the same name, Researches, 
himself a superior classical scholar, and one of the most dis- 
tinuished archaeologists of this or any other age, who is a 
resident of Berlin. His researches have attracted profound 
attention and approval from men of critical scholarship and 
learning on this subject. Schaff cites Zumpt as claiming "that 
there is nothing in Luke's account which does not receive from 
modern research full historical probability "^ His conclusion 

* Joseph. Ant. xvi, 2, 3; Wars, VI, 6, 2. & Christ born at Beth. 188. 

« Jesus the Messiah, 1, 182, 183. ** Schaff, Ch. Hist. I, 125, n. 8. 

6 



80 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

that the date of the birth of Christ occurred at the time of 
the taking of the census (B. C. 4) by Quirinius is indorsed by 
the scholarly Mommsen, and accords with the views of Ideler, 
Bergmann, Browne, Ussher, and Sanclemente, as also with those 
of Borghesi, De Kossi, Ramsay, and Schaff. In brief, Zumpt 
concludes that Saturninus was governor of Syria in B. C. 9-6, 
Yarus 6-4, and Quirinius 4-1 A. D., and again 6-11, corrected 
chronology. 45 

A question of vital interest historically has been discussed 
of recent years : How could Quirinius have ordered an enroll- 
§52. The Two ment of the Jews in Palestine in B. C. 4, when it 
Registrations. } s a k nown f ac t that he was appointed governor 
of Syria and made a registration there ten years later, in 
A. D. 6 corrected chronology ? The complete answer is, that 
Quirinius was appointed to that office twice. His first appoint- 
ment was in B. C. 4, and his second in A. D. 6. In the first 
instance his function was to take a census of the Jewish popu- 
lation; in the second, it was a registration of the Jews' prop- 
erty, for the purpose of taxation. Under Pompey (B. C. 63) 
the Jewish nation had been reduced to a dependency upon the 
Roman Empire, and paid a certain tribute to the imperial 
power. It was now contemplated to replace the produce- 
tribute due Rome by an individual head-tax imposed upon 
every man and woman in the nation between the ages of four- 
teen and sixty-five. The census, however, was taken under 
the management of several governors in succession. It was 
begun under Sentius Saturninus, and continued under Quin- 
tilius Yarus, and completed under Publius Sulpicius Quirinius, 
as already stated. 

In this connection it should be noted that this was not 
merely a local tax of the Jews in Palestine: it was a universal 
taxation extending to all the nations and dependencies em- 
braced within the Roman Empire; for Augustus is said to 

« That is, Saturninus was governor A. U. 746-748, Varus 748-750, Quirinius 750- 
753, and again 760-765. 



Circumstances Concurred with the Nativity. 81 

have adopted the policy of gathering the statistics of his 
imperial resources by means of agents employed throughout 
the empire, which he himself tabulated for ready reference. 
These tabulations were of two classes ; the first being " a sort 
of balance sheet published periodically" for the information 
of the people; 46 the second, a kind of compendium summing 
up the dependencies, kingdoms, countries, and allies, to indi- 
cate the resource and military power of the Koman Empire. 47 
These celebrated tables of statistics are said to have been read 
in the Koman Senate on the occasion of the emperor's death. 48 
Now, it is quite obvious that Luke, with that historical 
instinct which characterizes his authorship throughout, makes 
distinct reference to both enrollments in a man- 

§ 53. Luke 

ner indicating a perfect understanding of the notes both 
situation on his own part, and on that of his con- nro men s# 
temporaries whom he addresses. He refers to the first enroll- 
ment as a principal fact concurrent with the Nativity of Jesus, 
and he alludes to the second incidentally in narrating what 
Gamaliel said before the Jewish Sanhedrin in the defense of 
the apostles. In recounting the different rebellions in Pales- 
tine against the Koman power, Gamaliel recalled, " After this 
man [Theudas], rose up Judas of Galilee in the days of the 
enrollment" 49 In the absence of any explanation, these two 
references indicate that the Evangelist knew that he was per- 
fectly secure of his ground in respect to both, and that the two 
enrollments were entirely familiar facts to his contemporaries. 
For he obviously wrote for those then living, not for those 
coming two thousand years afterwards. Those whom he 
addressed needed no explanations, and he offered none. 

The second governorship and enrollment were much the 
more important of the two. The appointment of Quirinius 
thereto was probably due in a large measure to his former rule 
as governor, and his superior tact and management of the 

46 Rationes imperii. *< Breviarium totius imperii. 48 Suetonius, Augustus, 

28, 101; Tacitus, Annals, 1, 11; Dion Cassius, lii, 30; lvi, 33. 49 Acts v, 37. 



82 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

people in taking the census previously. The imposition of the 
imperial tax had always involved much delicacy on the part 
of the government of Syria, owing to the extreme sensitive- 
ness of the Jews on that subject. The supreme thing in the 
mind of Augustus was that order and quiet should be pre- 
served among the people in the dependencies of the empire. 
How difficult and delicate the duties imposed on Quirinius in 
enrolling the property of the Jews for taxation are evident 
from the fact that the attempts afterward to carry out the 
imperial requirement were met with vigorous resistance, and 
finally issued in an open rebellion and war against the Komans, 
which terminated in the complete overthrow and extermina- 
tion of the Jewish nationality. 

§54. Historical Dr. Philip Schaff cites with approval several 
Accounts, high authorities as having an important bearing 
upon this historical question. 50 He says: 

" Cassiodorus 51 and Suidas 62 expressly assert the fact of a general 
census, and add several particulars which are not derived from Luke; 
e. g., Suidas says that Augustus elected twenty commissioners of high 
character, and sent them to all parts of the empire to collect statistics 
of the population as well as of property, and to return a portion to the 
national treasury. Hence Huschke, Wieseler, Zumpt, Plumptre, and 
McClellan accept their testimony as historically correct. . . . Wieseler 
quotes also John Malala, the historian of Antioch, as saying, probably on 
earlier authorities, that 'Augustus in the thirty-ninth year and tenth 
month of his reign [i. e., B. C. 5 or 6], issued a decree for a general reg- 
istration throughout the empire.* Julius Caesar had begun a measure- 
ment of the whole empire, and Augustus completed it." 

CONFIRMATIONS BY ENEMIES. 

Josephus does not notice the ^7^ governorship of Quirinius 

in Syria, and his taking the census of the population of the Jews 

concurrently with the birth of Jesus. Silence in 

§55. Testi- J 

mony of a writer of a given fact, however, can not be le- 
osep us. gftimately construed as evidence that it never oc- 
curred. Silence neither proves nor disproves any circumstance. 

60 Hist. Church, 1, 124, 125, n. 4. &i Variarum, lii, 52. 

5a 'A7ro7pa077, written about A. D. 19. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 83 

No historian records every event of a given time, especially 
such as does not come within the scope of his work. Josephus 
was not writing a history of the Eoman Empire, much less of 
the origin of Christianity, that he should have referred to the 
census or to Christ's birth. The first administration of Quir- 
inius was, in fact, merely preparatory for the second, and bore 
no comparison with it in importance and results. A mere 
census-taking was a very harmless matter in itself; but the 
inauguration of an imperial tax upon every man and woman 
in the nation was most offensive to the susceptibilities of the 
Jews. 

The second administration of Quirinius in Syria and Pales- 
tine immediately succeeded the deposing of Archelaus from 
his ethnarchy of Judaea when his territory became a Roman 
province under the government of Syria. In reference to 
Quirinius's second governorship, Luke cites briefly the speech 
of Gamaliel before the Sanhedrin thus: "After this man 
[Theudas], rose up Judas of Galilee, in the days of the taxing, 
and drew away much people after him. He also perished, and 
as many as followed him were dispersed. 53 Josephus refers to 
the conduct of both Theudas and Judas of Galilee by name. 54 
His testimony is: 

" Now Quirinius, a Roman Senator, and one who had gone through 
other magistracies, and had passed through them till he had been made 
consul, . . . was of great dignity, . . . being sent by [GaiusJ Ceesartobe 
judge of the nation, and to take an account of their substance. . . . There 
was one Judas, a Gaulonite, of a city whose name was Gamala, who, 
taking with him Sadduc, a Pharisee, became zealous to draw them to a 
revolt, who both said that this taxation was no better than an introduc- 
tion to slavery, and exhorted their nation to assert their liberty." 55 

Why Josephus mentions this "Judas, a Gaulonite of Ga- 
mala," and elsewhere in four instances, and in both histories, 
calls him " Judas of Galilee," is not known. Perhaps he was 
born in Galilee, and afterward resided in Gamala — as Jesus 
was called a Galilean, 56 though he was born in Judaea. Jose- 
63 Acts v, 37. 64 Ant. xx, 5, 1, 2. v>Ib. xviii, 1, 1. 66 Matt, ii, 23. 



84 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

phus mentions him as the author of a certain philosophy 57 
among the Jews ; in noting that " the two sons of Judas of 
Galilee were slain: I mean that Judas who caused the people 
to revolt when Quirinius came to take an account of the estates 
of the Jews;" 58 "when Archelaus's part of Judsea was reduced 
to a province ... a certain Galilean, whose name was Judas, 
prevailed with his countrymen to revolt, and said that they 
were cowards if they would endure to pay a tax to the Ro- 
mans. 59 "In the meantime one Manahem, the son of Judas 
that was called a Galilean, who . . . had formerly reproached 
the Jews under Quirinius, that after God, they were subject 
to the Eomans." 60 

The witness of the Emperor Julian touching Quirinius is 

here in place. Having in his command all the archives of the 

. empire, he is conscious of the absolute certainty 

monyof of his knowledge and resources in the case, and 
assumes a defiant tone against the Christians re- 
specting Joseph and Mary being at Bethlehem at the time 
that Quirinius was enrolling the Jews. He says : 

"Jesus whom you celebrate was one of Caesar's subjects. If you 
dispute it I will prove it by and by ; but it may as well be done now. 
For yourselves, allow that he was enrolled with his father and mother in 
the time of Quirinius." " But Jesus having persuaded a few among you, 
and those the worst of men, has now been celebrated about three hun- 
dred years, having done nothing in his lifetime worthy of remembrance 
— unless one thinks it a mighty matter to heal lame and blind people, 
and exorcise demoniacs in the villages of Bethsaida and Bethany." 61 

Here are three distinct implications which should not pass 
unnoticed : 

(1.) That Julian stood prepared to prove his statement, if the Chris- 
tians disputed it. 

(2.) That Jesus was enrolled with his father and mother in the time 
of Quirinius. 

(3.) That the Christians themselves knew and allowed his proposi- 
tion to be true. 



"Ant. xviii, 1, 6. ^Ib. xx, 5, 2. ^Wars, ii, 8, 1. «>Ib. ii, 17, 8. 

« Cyril, cited in Lardner's Works, VII, 626, 627. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the ^Nativity. 85 

Certainly there was no other time than this when Jesus 
could have been "enrolled as one of Caesar's subjects" "in the 
time of Quirinius." The witness of these adversaries of Chris- 
tianity may now receive confirmation from 

§ 57. Patristic Testimony. 

a) Justin Martyr, who was a native Syrian and wrote about 
the middle of the second century, addressed the emperor, the 
Caesars, the Senate, and the people of Kome, appealing to the 
enrollment of Quirinius then in the governmental archives in 
their possession. He says: 

"Now there is a village in the land of the Jews, thirty-five stadia 
from Jerusalem, in which Jesus Christ was born, as you can ascertain 
also from the registers of the taxing under Quirinius, your first procurator 
in Judaea." 62 

/3) Quintus S. F. Tertullian, the Father of Latin Theology, 
born in Carthage, Africa, was eminent in the profession of 
law. He was a man distinguished for his learning and elo- 
quence. Writing with a different purpose and from a different 
country, he refers to the same enrollment and the same period, 
mentioning Saturninus under whom the Palestinian enroll- 
ment was begun, and afterward completed by Quirinius. He 
says: 

"There is historical proof that at this very time a census had been 
taken in Judaea by Sentius Saturninus which might have satisfied their 
inquiry respecting the family and descent of Christ." 63 Franciscus 
Junius is quoted as authority for the historical statement that " the 
agent through whom Saturninus carried out the Census in Judaea was 
the governor Quirinius, according to Luke ii." 

y) Clement of Alexandria, a native of Athens, who was 
eminent for his talents and learning of the Christians, wrote 
about the same time as Tertullian, near the close of the second 
century. He says : " Our Lord was born in the twenty-eighth 
year when first the enrollment was ordered to be taken, in the 
reign of Augustus. 1 '' M 

62 First Apology, c. 34. 63 Marcion, iv, c. 19, and note 3. 

64 "0t6 irpCrrov itctXevcrav airoypcupav yevtadai, Strom. Bk. i, c. 21. 



86 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



RECORROBORATIONS. 

a) A fragment of an inscription recording the honors of a 

Roman officer named Q. iEmilius Secundus, who rendered dis- 

« „« ™ tinguished service under Quirinius when he was 

§58. Monu- ° ^ 

mental Testi- governor of Syria, was by Mommsen and other 
high authorities condemned as a modern forgery 
and fraud, perpetrated to give some support to Luke's state- 
ment, because it mentioned the census taken by Quirinius. 
But recently the lost half of the stone was discovered in the 
demolition of a building in Yenice, Italy, and the recovery 
justified the inscription as both ancient and genuine. It rep- 
resents that, 

" By the orders of Quirinius, he made the census of the population 
of Apamea [a district in Syria], enumerating 117,000 citizens. The 
emphasis laid on the number suggests that the numbering of the total 
population was the chief object of the Apamean census. . . . The 
inscription leaves it uncertain whether the Apamean numbering oc- 
curred in the first or second administration of Syria by Quirinius." 

He is called Caesar's legate of Syria. 65 

/?) A fragrament of a marble slab was discovered in 1764, 
near Tibur (Tivoli), bearing an inscription related to early 
Christianity, which is now in the custody of the Lateran 
Museum of Christian Antiquities. It is a record in honor of a 
Eoman officer during the reign of Augustus. He was the 
conqueror of a nation, and for his military successes he was 
honored at Rome with two thanksgivings made to the gods y 66 
honors representing a general in war, clad in magnificent 
robes, bearing his ivory scepter, borne in his triumphal chariot, 
etc. He had been proconsul of Asia, and, as a legate of 
Augustus, was governor of Syria twice. The name is ob- 
literated, but the case fits no other conqueror of the period 
than Quirinius, with respect to whom, however, the fitness is 
so exactly complete that the consensus of the best authorities, 
such as Mommsen, Borghesi, De Rossi, Henzen, Dessau, and 

65 Ramsay, Christ Born at Beth., 150, 151, 168, 240, 241. 
68 Supplicationes, Ramsay, 281. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 87 

others, assigns this monuscription to Publius Sulpicius Quiri- 
nius, governor of Syria twice. 67 

y) This twofold legation is founded upon the statement of 
Tacitus, which is confirmed by monumental testimony un- 
earthed between the villa Hadriani and the Yia Tiburtina at 
Rome. Here again the inscription is nameless, and some other 
parts are lost. The circumstance known, however, adapt them- 
selves to no other than Quirinius, in the judgment of Bergmann, 
Mommsen, Merivale, Zumpt, and others. Supplying the miss- 
ing parts, the inscription then would read : " Quirinius as pro- 
consul obtained Asia as a province. As Legate of the deified 
Augustus, a second time, fie governed Syria and Phoenicia."® 

Besides these, there are three instances of enrollments re- 
corded upon the monument of Ancyra, dating respectively 
A. U. 726, 748, 767. "Tertullian, who was a learned lawyer, 
speaks of one in Judaea under Sentius Saturninus A. U. 749; 
and this would be the one which must be meant by Luke." 69 

§ 59. Summary of the Evidence. 

How, then, does the case stand? The several circumstances 
concurrent with the Nativity and infancy of Jesus, as narrated 
by the Evangelist, are ten in number. These are, the appear- 
ance of a strange star, the visit of the Magi, their worship of 
the Child Jesus, Joseph warned to flee the country, Joseph's 
flight into Egypt, Herod's massacre of the children, his mo- 
tive for this procedure, the death of King Herod, the return 
of Joseph and his family, and the enrollment of Quirinius. Of 
these, seven have been substantiated by the testimony of the 
arch-enemy Celsus. Three or four of these have demanded 
special discussion as principal facts, viz.: 

(1) The Magi and the Star of the East. 

(2) The Death of Herod the Great. 

(3) The Enrollment under Quirinius. 



w Ramsay, Christ Born, etc., c. xi, 227, 228. 

68 . . . Pro. Consul. Asiam. Provinctam. Op[tintjit legattjs]. Divi. 
Aitgusti. [i]tebum \i. e, the second time] Striam. Et. Ph[cenioem admin- 
istravit [or obtinuit]. See Schaff, Ch. Hist. 1, 123, note 1. 

69 Schaff, Hist. 1, 124, note 1. 



88 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

a) Matthew's account of the Magi and their mysterious 
guide in the Star of the East finds support in many tradi- 
tions of different lands and peoples. These are interesting, 
and are given for all they are worth. If they be set 
aside because they are traditions, their origin without an 
historical basis should be satisfactorily accounted for. Never- 
theless, the main support of the argument related to the star 
is rabbinical testimony, found in the Talmud as explanatory of 
certain Messianic passages which affirm that the Messiah's 
advent was to be signalized by a star. Hence, too, the meas- 
ure of success which accompanied the impostor Bar-Kokheba, 
"the Son of a Star," who, claiming to be the Messiah, struck 
coin with the image of a star. These evidences are confirmed 
by patristic testimony / that of Irenaeus, Justin, and Tertul- 
lian. A further confirmation respecting the star of the Magi 
is founded upon the astronomical discovery of the conjunction 
of the planets, so satisfactory to the minds of the great astron- 
omers, Kepler, Schubert, Pritchard, Encke, Pingre, and others. 

P) A second principal fact looking to the date of the Na- 
tivity is also of a scientific character based upon astronomy, 
in the moon's eclipse, which Josephus says occurred on or 
near " that very night when King Herod died." This was on 
March 13, A. U. 750, or B. C. 4. As Herod was alive and 
sought the young Child's life in the massacre of the children, 
it is quite probable that the king died within the first year 
after Christ's birth, if not indeed within a few months of the 
Nativity. 

y) Finally, the last principal fact furnishing the basis of 
an argument respecting the time of Christ's birth is the enroll- 
ment of Quirinius as mentioned by Luke. The requirement 
of the census was of the Romans ; the method of its execution 
was that of the Jews. This arrangement brought Joseph and 
Mary to the territory of Judah, and to the city of David, 
where Jesus was born in exact accordance with the prediction 
of prophecy. 



Circumstances Concurrent with the Nativity. 89 

That Quirinius was twice appointed governor of Syria is re- 
ferred to by Luke ; is substantiated by Cassiodorus, the Latin his- 
torian, and by Suidas, the lexicographer and geographer, who 
attest that some twenty honorable commissioners were sent 
by the emperor throughout the empire to collect statistics of 
the population and property. John Malala, the historian of 
Antioch, testifies distinctly that Augustus issued his imperial 
decree for a general registration of the empire as early as 
B. C. 5 or 6 ; that Julius Caesar began the measurement of the 
whole empire, and Augustus completed it. 

In this connection much emphasis is laid upon the testi- 
mony of the Emperor Julian, who affirms in absolute terms 
that Joseph and Mary, with Jesus, were registered under 
Quirinius, as the Christians themselves acknowledged, when 
Jesus became "one of Caesar's subjects." Christ also confirmed 
the same when afterwards in his ministry he taught his 
enemies, "Bender unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, 
and unto God the things which are God's." The occurrence 
of the enrollment at that time is amply confirmed by the testi- 
mony of Justin and Tertullian, both of whom appeal to the 
Koman records in the archives of the government at Eome for 
the verification of their statements ; and the same fact of the 
census is assumed in the testimony of Clement of Alexandria. 

Further, the vindication of Luke's statement of the census- 
taking by Quirinius at the time when Christ was born, is 
found in three or four monumental inscriptions of recent dis- 
covery which give honor to Quirinius, or verify his enrollment 
of the Jews B. C. 4. 

The fact of the conjunction of the planets Jupiter, Saturn, 
and Mars, supplemented by a comet, as determined by 
Wieseler in A. XL 750, with that of the moon's eclipse on the 
night near to Herod's death in 750, and the enrollment of 
Quirinius in the same year, constitute in combination a power- 
ful argument that the historical event that Jesus was born 
B. C. 4 took place according to our current chronology. 



CHAPTER IV. 

UNIQUE PLACE OF JOHN THE BAPTIST IN 
HISTORY. 

I. John's Character and Mission. 
II. The Chronology of his Work. 

III. His Imprisonment and Death. 

IV. The Relation of his Work to Jesus. 

91 



Chapter IV. 
HISTOEICAL PLACE OF JOHN THE BAPTIST. 

§ 60. Sources : Biographical Epitomes, and Literature. 

1. Eusebius Pamphilius (b. 265-d. 340) was a native of Palestine, and be- 
came Bishop of Caesarea 315, when he wrote his Ecclesiastical His- 
tory. Upon the martyrdom of his eminent teacher in the Theolog- 
ical School at Caesarea, named Pamphilius, Eusebius assumed his 
name in loving remembrance of him. He was a man of great 
abilities, and the confidante of the Emperor Constantine the Great, 
who requested Eusebius to open the proceedings of the Council 
of Nicsea in 325 with an oration, and assigned him the place of 
imperial honor at his own right hand during its sessions. Dean 
Stanley mentions Eusebius as at once " the clerk of the im- 
perial closet, the interpreter, the chaplain, and the confessor of 
Constantine." 

Eusebius published more than thirty different literary works, 
critical, historical, exegetical, doctrinal, and apologetic. Besides 
this broad authorship, he continued in the exercise of the func- 
tions of orator, minister, and bishop. His pre-eminence is indi- 
cated in that he is called " the Father of Church History, the Chris- 
tian Herodotus," and is the recognized founder of the school of 
Ecclesiastical Historians whose work continued down through 
several centuries. "All Greek authors of the fourth century who 
undertook to write the history of the Church, began where Euse- 
bius ended, as having nothing considerable to add to his labor. " 
(Tillemont.) He wrote in Greek, and "his Church History and 
Chronicle will always remain an invaluable collection of informa- 
tion not attainable in any other eminent author." (Schaff.) " Eu- 
sebius seems to have been very disinterested, very sincere, and a 
great lover of peace, of truth, and religion." (Du Pin.) " Beyond 
question the most learned and most famous of living writers at 
that time." (Lightfoot.) " Of all his works, the Ecclesiastical 
History is the most invaluable." (Lardner.) "Eusebius, to 
whose zeal we owe most of what is known of the history of the 
New Testament . . . quotes the Gospels eighteen times." 
(Westcott.) 

93 



94 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



2. Dion Cassius (b. 155) was a native of Nicsea, Bithynia, in Asia Minor. 

He went to Rome and became a senator in the reign or soon after 
the death of Aurelius (161-180) . He was made consul the second 
time under the reign of Alexander Severus (222-235), but died 
soon after. He wrote Roman history in the Greek language, in 
which eighty books were written in decades, of which only eighteen 
or nineteen books have been preserved in their entirety. He 
gives an account of events from the landing of iEneas in Italy 
down to A. D. 229. He is generally esteemed as an eminent his- 
torian, who was careful in research, exact in dates, and pre-emi- 
nent for his elegance of style. "The various important offices 
which he held under the emperors gave him valuable opportuni- 
ties for historical investigation." (Encyc. Brit.) An abridged 
translation by J. Xiphilin appeared in London, 1704. The natural 
sympathy which Dion Cassius felt for the government which had 
intrusted him with these several offices, and access given him to 
the contents of its archives for materials to write its history, suf- 
ficiently justify the belief that Dion Cassius must be classed with 
the adversaries of the Christian religion, or he would not have 
been loyal to the Roman Empire. 

3. David F. Strauss was a German skeptic, born at Wurtemberg in 

1808, and died of cancer in his native place on February 9, 1874. 
He studied at Tubingen under F. C. Baur, the famous adversary 
of Christianity, pursuing both a classical and theological course. 
In 1835, when twenty-seven, he published his Life of Christ. He 
attempted to account for Christianity on the basis of a Mythical 
Theory, and in the Preface of his work he insisted that miracle, 
prophecy, or indeed anything called supernatural, can not be, and 
is unhistorical. Nevertheless, he admits that " Christianity is a 
moral and spiritual power in the earth;" that " we can not do 
without it, nor can it be lost;" that ''Jesus stands foremost 
among those who have given a higher ideal to humanity." How- 
ever, Strauss absolutely fails to account for all this power when 
he holds for the ideal, but not as an historical religion. He does 
not explain how it is that mere myths should have become "a 
moral and spiritual power in the earth ;" and be of such character 
that "we can not do without it, nor can it be lost! " Are myths 
a necessity to humanity? Historical criticism so destroyed 
Strauss's "Mythical Theory" of the Gospels that he felt con- 
strained in 1864 to rewrite his Life of Jesus. It made but little 
impression on the world, however. In his last work, entitled The 
Old Faith and the New, he repudiates his former estimate of 
Christ's character as a religious genius, holding that his chief 
characteristic was "fantastic fanaticism," and his resurrection 
from the dead " a world-wide humbug." He denied immortality. 
Truly he began as an idealist, and ended a materialist. 



Historical Place of John the Baptist. 95 



§61. Place of John the Baptist in History. 

'H ay la tQv evayyeklwv rerpaKT^ — "The Holy Quaternion of the Gospels. — 

EUSEBIUS. 

The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. — Make. 
There came a man sent from God whose name was John ; the same came 

for witness that he might bear witness of the Light. . . . He 

was a burning and a shining light. — John. 
Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women, there hath 

not arisen a greater than John the Baptist. — Jesus. 

ARGUMENT. 

The ancient adversaries of Christianity in their writings have much to 
say of the noble and devout character of John the Baptist, but are 
almost silent touching the supreme character of Jesus, the Christ 
of God. Nevertheless, what they say of the Baptist accords well 
with the statements of the Gospels, and furnishes this added inter- 
est, that they supplement certain details which are omitted by 
the Evangelists, pertaining to the close of John's life. In their 
cognition of the Baptist's character and ministry they furnish a 
connecting link with the Christ of History, and so far verify the 
antiquity and authenticity of the New Testament. 

The relation of John the Baptist to the person and Gospel 
of Jesus Christ is highly important in this historical inquiry. 
John's whole public service was of a character to prepare the 
people and to introduce with his witness the Christ of the Scrip- 
tures ; and accordingly John's ministry in history derives its sig- 
nificance from his relation to the person and work of Jesus Christ. 
It was the express function of the Baptist to be the announcer to 
the world of the Christ who was to follow, and of his kingdom 
then at hand, calling upon the people to repent and be baptized 
unto a better life. By the rite of John's baptism the Lord Jesus 
was inaugurated into his Messianic ministry, when it was revealed 
from heaven by Another Witness that Jesus was the Son of God. 
This work accomplished, John disappears from the page of history. 

1. Character and Ministry of John. 

2. The Chronology of John's Work. 

3. Imprisonment and Death of John. 

4. Relation of his Ministry to Jesus. 

a) John's Sanctity and Work. 

All four Evangelists record briefly the historical existence 
of this last prophet of Israel, the famous announcer of Christ 
and his kingdom. The first two Gospels declare substantially 



96 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

the same facts with some variety of expression, indicating 
§ 62. The gos- at once the function of the Baptist's preach- 

pels and the . . . 

Baptist. mg, and his marvelous influence and power 
with the people: 

" In those days cometh John the Baptist preaching in the wilderness 
of Judsea, saying, Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. For 
this is he that was spoken of by Isaiah the prophet saying, 

The voice of one crying in the wilderness, 
Make ye ready the way of the Lord ; 
Make his paths straight. 

Then went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judsea, and all the region round 
about Jordan, and they were all baptized of him in the river Jordan, con- 
fessing their sins." 1 

Luke opens his Gospel with an account of John's birth, and 
Mark with an account of his public life. After a few sen- 
tences in the opening of the fourth Gospel, John introduces 
the Baptist with the special remark, " There came a man sent 
from God, whose name was John;" 2 and Mark adds that 
"Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and 
holy man." 3 In respect to John's ministry Luke recalls the 
prophecy of his father Zacharias over his infant child, " Thou, 
child, shalt be called the prophet of the Most High." Then, 
passing over the long solitude and silence of his private life in 
the desert, he resumes at the beginning point of his public 
activities : 

"The word of God came to John the son of Zacharias in the wilder- 
ness; and he came into all the region round about Jordan preaching 
the baptism of repentance unto the remission of sins. With many other 
exhortations therefore preached he good tidings unto the people." 4 

Eusebius transmits some interesting particu- 

mony of lars which are helpful to a proper understanding 

use ma. Q ^ ^ e p Ur p 0se k ac i by fa e Evangelists in opening 

their several Gospels with reference to the time of the Bap- 
tist's ministry. He says: 

" The apostle [John] in his Gospel gives the deeds of Jesus before 
the Baptist was cast into prison ; but the other three Evangelists men- 



iMatt.iii,l-3,5;comp. Mark i, 2-5. 2Johni,6. 3Markvi,20. 4 Luke iii, 2, 3, 18. 



Historical Place of John the Baptist. 97 

tion the circumstances [occurring] after that event." " For it is evident 
that the other three Evangelists only wrote the deeds of our Lord for 
one year after the imprisonment of John the Baptist, and intimated 
that in the very beginning of their history." 5 

Josephus confirms the Evangelists in nearly every essential 

particular. He says : 

"Now, some of the Jews thought that the destruction of Herod's 
army came from God, and that very justly, as a punishment for what he 
did against John that was called the Baptist. For Herod 
[Antipas] slew him who was a good man, and commanded § 64, Jos ephus 
; L -r x • . . ,., . ,, and the 

the Jews to exercise virtue both as to righteousness Baptist. 

toward one another and piety toward God, and so to 
come to his baptism, . . . supposing that the soul was thoroughly 
purified beforehand by righteousness. Now, when others came in 
crowds about him — for they were greatly moved by hearing his words — 
Herod feared lest the great influence of John which he had over the 
people might put it in his power and inclination to raise a rebellion, for 
they seemed ready to do anything he would advise," 6 etc. 

The accordancy of Josephus's witness with the record of 
the Evangelists respecting the private character and public 
influence of the Baptist is complete in proving the main facts 
so far as stated in the Gospels to be historical. It leaves 
nothing more to be desired. The confirmation of Josephus is 
distinct and decisive on the following points : 

1. He identifies by name and occupation the man known as "John who 

was called the Baptist." 

2. He affirms his uprightness and religious character before the public : 

" He was a good man." 

3. He commends his ministry: "Who commanded virtue toward men, 

and piety towards God." 

4. He mentions John's religious function for a better life: that men 

" should come to his baptism." 

5. He accredits him with great influence over men: " Herod feared the 

great influence of John." 

ft) Chronology of John's Ministry. 
To complete the historicity of John's ministry, its chro- 
nology remains to be considered. In a manner § 65t Luke's 
very remarkable, but with characteristic exact- chronology, 
ness, Luke gives his chronological data in accordance with the 

s Eccl. Hist. B. iii, c. 24, p. 98, Bohn's ed. *Antiq. xviii, 5, 2. 



98 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

usage of his age. In referring to the Baptist's life and work 
he mentions all the rulers of his period in Palestine, whether 
civil or ecclesiastical, whether imperial or local, together with 
their respective offices and realms. He specifies no distinct 
dates, which is a modern custom ; but he designates by periods 
and rulers, which was the common ancient custom. Nothing 
could better prove that the writer of the third Gospel was a 
contemporary of the times in which he is commonly believed 
to have written than this method of indicating events by 
reigns and rulers ; and nothing would sooner betray a later 
authorship of Luke's writings than the more modern mode of 
dating by the calendar. But without hesitation or explana- 
tion, and assuming it to be understood by his contemporaries 
and their successors as much as by himself, Luke gives a long 
list of officials, and their respective places, without a single 
mistake. He says: 

" Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius 
Pilate being governor of Judaea, and Herod [Antipas] being tetrarch of 
Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and 
Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene, in the high priesthood of 
Annas and Gaiaphas, the Word of God came unto John, the son of Zacha- 
rias in the wilderness." 7 

Dr. David Friedrich Strauss, of Germany, the stalwart 
§66. strauss's enemy of Christianity for the past century, 
confirmation. a ffi rms the absolute correctness of Luke's histor- 
ical chronology. He says : 

" Luke determines the date of John's appearance by various syn- 
chronisms, placing it in the time of Pilate's government in Judaea, in the 
sovereignty of Herod, of Philip and Lysanias over the divisions of Pales- 
tine, and in the high priesthood of Annas and Gaiaphas, and moreover 
precisely in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius, which, reckoning 
from the death of Augustus, corresponds with the year 28-29 of our era. 
With this last and closest demarcation of time, all the foregoing less precise 
ones agree. Even that which makes Annas high priest together with Caiaphas 
appears correct if we consider the peculiar influence which that ex-high priest 
retained."* 



i Luke's Gospel, iii, 1, 2. » Leben Jesu, § 44, pp. 300, 301. 



Historical Place of John the Baptist. 99 

There is further confirmation of this chronology given by 
the Latin historian of fame, Tacitus, a contemporary of Luke, 
who was writing upon the crucifixion of Jesus. ^ 

° r ^§67. Conflr- 

Both John the Baptist and Jesus died within less mation by 
than four years of this chronological datum of 
the beginning of John's ministry, and perhaps within two 
years of each other. No changes occurred among the rulers 
during this brief period. This same Herod Antipas of Galilee 
figures with his soldiers in mockery of Jesus before the cru- 
cifixion. 9 Tacitus observes: 

''Christ, the Founder of that name, was put to death as a crimi- 
nal by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judaea, in the reign of Tiberius 
[Caesar]. " 10 

Here again is entire agreement with Luke's chronology. 
Pilate ruled as procurator of Judaea, in behalf of the Eoman 
Empire, for a single decade — viz., 26-36 A. D. — and Tiberius 
reigned as emperor for twenty-three years; viz., 14-37 A. D. 
Now, a twofold advantage arises in placing together, in com- 
parison, the witness of Luke's chronology respecting the Bap- 
tist's ministry and that of Tacitus respecting Christ's cruci- 
fixion. First, it evidences the customary method of the 
writers of those times in indicating chronological data by 
definite periods falling within the reign of certain rulers; 
secondly, in proving the very historical identity of the rulers 
in power during John's ministry as well as that of Christ. 
Luke and Tacitus were contemporaries, writing of different per- 
sons, but citing the same rulers as in office at the same time. 
It would be difficult to find any historical proof more conclusive. 

To this may be added the testimony of Jo- § 6a confir- 

, . , , . t , . maticn by 

sephus as a third and independent witness, cor- josepnus. 
roborative of Luke's statement of the local rulers, and their 
respective forms of government : 

" While Herod and Philip had each of them received his own te- 
trarchy and settled the affairs thereof, . . . the other sons of Herod 

9 Luke xxiii, 7-11. ™Annals, xv, 44. 

LofC. 



100 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

[the Great], Philip [II], and that Herod who was called Antipas, each of 
them took upon him the administration of their own tetrarchies." 
''Now, Pilate who was sent as procurator into Judaea by Tiberius," u etc. 

y) John's Imprisonment and Death. 
Attention may now be directed to the unrighteous impris- 
onment of this righteous man John, by Herod Antipas, the 
tetrarch of Galilee, by whose order he was finally executed in 
the prison. The several Gospels, taken in their order, record 
the special occasion of Herod's procedure against the Baptist. 

Matthew says: " Herod had laid hold on John and bound him, and 
put him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip's wife. 
For John said unto him [Herod], It is not lawful for thee 
^^?' Jonn ' s to have her. And when he would have put him to death, 
he feared the multitude because they counted him as a 
prophet. Now when he [Jesus] heard that John was delivered up, he 
withdrew into Galilee." 12 Mark mentions the same thing, adding of 
Herod that "he had married her." 13 Luke says that "Herod the te- 
trarch, being reproved by him for Herodias his brother's wife, and for all 
the things which Herod had done, added yet this above all, that he shut 
up John in prison." 14 The apostle John makes this brief reference: 
" For John was not yet cast into prison." 15 

§70.^ Jose- Josephus not only confirms the Evangelists as 

firmation. to the vile character of Herodias, but enlarges 

upon the intrigue of Herod with this woman, adding: 

" But Herodias . . . was married to Herod [Philip I], the son of 
Herod the Great, who was born of Mariamne, the daughter of Simon the 
high priest, who had a daughter Salome, after whose birth Herodias 
took upon her to confound the laws of our country, and divorce herself 
from her husband while he was alive, and was married to Herod [Anti- 
pas], her husband's brother by the father's side. He was tetrarch of 
Galilee." 16 "About this time Aretas [the King of Arabia Petrsea] and 
Herod [Antipas] had a quarrel on the following account: Herod the 
tetrarch had married the daughter of Aretas, and had lived with her 
a great while. . . . However, he fell in love with Herodias, this last 
Herod [Philip's] wife," and intrigued to marry her which Herod Antipas 
finally accomplished. " One article of this marriage also was this, that 
he should divorce Aretas's daughter."* 

Josephus does not seem to have been aware of John's 

reproof administered to Herod Antipas, for which the tetrarch 

*Ant. xviii, 5, 1, 2; xvii, JO, 9. 

n A nt. xviii, 2, 1 ; Wars, ii, ix, 1, 2. 12 Matt, xiv, 3-12 ; iv, 12. is Mark vi, 17-20. 

"Luke iii, 19, 20. u John iii, 24. ™Ant. xviii, 5, 4; xviii, 7, 1. 



Historical Place of John the Baptist. 101 

imprisoned him. But this is not all. For some time after John 
was immured another event occurred, which was „„„ n 

7 §71. Occasion 

the immediate occasion of his death. It was a of His 
revengeful execution; and the only Evangelists 
who record the particulars are the first two. Matthew 
mentions that — 

" When Herod's birthday came, the daughter of Herodias danced in 
the midst, and pleased Herod ; whereupon he promised with an oath to 
give her whatsoever she should ask. And she, being put forward by her 
mother, saith : Give me here in a platter the head of John the Baptist. 
And the king was grieved ; but for the sake of his oaths and of them 
that sat at meat with him, he commanded it to be given ; and he sent 
and beheaded John in prison. And his head was brought in a charger 
and given to the damsel ; and she brought it to her mother. And his 
disciples came and took up the corpse and buried him ; and they went 
and told Jesus." 17 

Mark aflirms the same facts, but gives these added particu- 
lars, viz.: that "Herodias set herself against him, and desired 
to kill him, but she could not ; for Herod feared John, knowing 
that he was a righteous and holy man; but he kept him safe;" 
that the birthday celebration consisted of "a supper to his 
lords, and high captains, and the chief men of Galilee ;" that 
"a soldier of the guard" was sent to behead him, and that 
Herod's promise to the girl would comprise any gift she 
would ask, even "to the half of his kingdom." 18 

These testimonies relating to Herod and He- o „ n m 

& §72. Testimo- 

rodias, when analyzed and compared, yield the nies com- 
f olio wing facts : pare 

1. Herod Antipas was previously married to the daughter of King Aretas 

of Petrsea. So affirms Josephus ; but the Evangelists are silent on 
that subject. 

2. Matthew and Mark mention a daughter of Herodias who danced on 

Herod's birthday. Josephus mentions her as Herod Philip's 
daughter, whose name was Salome. 

3. Mark assumes as a fact that Philip was alive when Antipas married 

Herodias. Josephus affirms that she "divorced herself from her 
husband [Philip] while he was alive." 

4. Three Evangelists record John's reproof of Herod, that his marrying 

Herodias was unlawful. Josephus alleges that Herodias's second 
marriage " confounded the Jewish laws." 

M Matt, xiv, &-12. is Mark vi, 19-29. 



102 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

It is evident that the Evangelists, with each other, and all 
with Josephus, are in such complete accord that not a single 
point of discrepancy appears, each one writing independently. 
At some points Josephus supplements what the Evangelists 
naturally omit as remote from their own particular line of 
historical narration. And all evince an accurate knowledge 
of public affairs which they undertake to record, even to the 
marital relations of the chief ruler of the realm. At all 
points the sacred writers are particularly without obscurity, 
without confusion, without mistake, albeit sometimes quite 
brief. And Josephus, writing apart from and independently 
of the Evangelists, more than corroborates them in that he 
gives added details of how Herod's marriage with Herodias 
came to pass; while the Evangelists relate only that which 
occurred after the wedding as its consequence. They mu- 
tually confirm ; and both are historical. 

It is something remarkable that the four Evangelists refer 
directly to the incarceration of the Baptist, but not one men- 
§73. Place of tions the name or location of the prison. Its 

Prison. identity, however, has been conclusively deter- 
mined by means of the details given by Josephus. Its modern 
Arabic name is Meaur, 19 anciently known as Macblerus, "a 
place on the borders of Aretas and Herod," "high in the 
mountain fastnesses of Peraea, on the east side of the Dead 
Sea," a few miles south of the northern extreme of that body 
of water. It is situate upon a lofty summit, surrounded by 
deep ravines on all sides, having by nature immense strength, 
and was originally intended to serve as a check upon the 
marauding tribes from Arabia, invading Palestine. It is not 
improbable that the banquet-hall in which Herod's birthday 
was celebrated was in the palace, quite near or immediately 
connected with this prison — the palace built and beautified by 
this tetrarch's father, Herod the Great. Josephus mentions 



is See Edersheim, Life of Christ, I, 659, 660; Tristam's Moab, 274-275; Baedeker, 
Palestine, ed. 1876, p. 308; and Josephus, Wars, vii, 6, 1. 



Histoeical Place of John the Baptist. 103 

"the royal palaces at Betharamptha, near the Jordan." 20 Dr. 
Farrar describes the 

" Palace-castle of Machserus on the eastern shore of the Dead Sea. It 
was built on the side of the ravine between Abarim and Pisgah, and not 
far from the baths of Calirrhoe. At this place he [Herod] and his 
courtiers, in soft clothing, would be near iEnon and other places where 
John baptized. . . . For Machserus, perched on the wild, precipitous 
rocks of the Zerka-ma-in, was inaccessible and impregnable, nor was 
there the least possibility that the prophet could ever be rescued by his 
followers from the rock-hewn dungeon beneath the splendid banquet- 
halls." "In the same mountains in which Israel sought for the grave 
of her first prophet [Moses], was her last [prophet] entombed." 21 

As to Herod's purpose in this procedure against the Bap- 
tist, Josephus remarks : 

" Herod . . . thought it best by putting him to death to prevent 
any mischief he might cause, and not bring himself into 
difficulties by sparing a man who might make him repent Motive, 
of it when it would be too late. Accordingly he [John] 
was sent a prisoner out of Herod's suspicious temper to Machserus, 
. . . and was there put to death." 22 

There is no divergence in the narration of historical facts 
between the sacred writers and Josephus touching John's im- 
prisonment and execution ; but there is a difference in the mo- 
tive imputed to Herod for such procedure. Josephus refers 
Herod's conduct to his extremely "suspicious temper" and 
fear of John's influence over the people, which might result in 
rebellion, and so "thought it best to put him to death to pre- 
vent any mischief thereafter ! " No overt act on John's part 
is hinted ; it was a mere matter of Herod's suspicious disposi- 
tion. Suspicion might possibly account for the arrest and in- 
carceration of John, but it could not justify his execution. 
Besides, when the Baptist's head was demanded by the women 
of his household, the tetrarch is said to have been "exceeding 
sorry:" "for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a just 
and holy man." * 

20 T6 UXrj<riov 'lopddvov (HaffiXeLa Kara Badapdfxadov ; comp. Wars, 11, 4, 2, and 
vii, 6, 1, 2. si The Herods, 170, 172, 174. 22 Ant. xviii, 5, 1, 2. ™ Mark vl, 20. 



104 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Upon the other hand, the Evangelists attribute the murder 
of John to the conspiracy of the two women, but especially to 
the malignant revenge sought and secured by the infamous 
Herodias because John had exercised the courage to confront 
the tetrarch and charge upon Herod and herself the guilt of 
illicit relations together. Herodias was a Jewess, who had 
" confounded the Jewish institutions," as Josephus puts it, by 
this bad conduct. Hence, " Herodias set herself against him, 
and desired to kill him, but she could not, for Herod . . . 
kept him safe." But she "nursed her wrath and kept it 
warm." But at the birthday festivities, when her daughter's 
graces had captivated Herod so that he swore to gratify her 
wish, even to the half of his realm, the mother saw her oppor- 
tunity to avenge her hate, and instigated a demand for the 
head of the Baptist, to be delivered to her in a platter, and 
though Herod "was grieved" at such a request, and too proud 
of his word passed in the presence of his distinguished guests, 
he sent the ax-man, who brought and presented the ghastly 
gift to the women before them all, to grace the celebration of 
Herod's birthday! All this ingrained subtlety, so perfectly 
characteristic of a bad woman's revenge and a weak man's 
vacillation, carries its own conviction of truth to the mind. 

Josephus obviously reflects the public opinion of the Jews, 
as he says, while the Evangelists furnish the internal and 
§75. Herod's private history of the case, touching John's re- 
valuation, proo^ no t known to the outer world. It is easy 
to understand how, at this time, the first Christians had spe- 
cial means of information, being in communication with 
John's disciples ; for after John's burial his disciples " went 
and told Jesus." Meantime opposite and conflicting impulses 
affected Herod's mind, and occasioned his vacillation of con- 
duct toward John at different times; for Mark relates that 
"Herod feared John; . . . and when he heard him he 
was much perplexed, and he heard him gladly." In the first 
instance, " the fear of John," whom he knew to be a good 



Historical Place of John the Baptist. 105 

man, added to the sting of his personal reproof and sense of 
guilt, constrained Herod to kill and silence him ; but, on re- 
flection, his " fear of the multitude," who believed in John, re- 
strained him from doing it. However conflicting the opposite 
motives, they were not incompatible. For, as Strauss remarks : 
" Antipas might well fear that John, by his strong censure of 
the marriage, and the whole course of the tetrarch's life would 
stir up the people into a rebellion against him." At length 
he compromised the matter by arresting John, to Jceejo him 
safe in prison. When, then, Herod's birthday had come 
around, his better judgment had somewhat assumed its sway, 
so that "the king was grieved" and "was exceeding sorry" 
when the surprising demand was made that John should be 
beheaded. However, all accounts attest that Herod did put 
John to death. Josephus does not contradict the Evan- 
gelists; the two motives assigned are not exclusive of each 
other in the case, but alternated powerfully in his con- 
sciousness. 

It has been objected that the beheading of John, a prophet, 
by the king was too remarkable a transaction in high life to 
be historical. But this is mere sentiment, not §76. skeptical 
fact. It was certainly a remarkable occurrence, 0b Jectoo*. 
but not therefore unhistorical. The account given of it by 
Josephus is even more marvelous than that of the Gospels. 
It can not be claimed that history furnishes no instance of de- 
capitation in high life at that early period by such an order. 
Dion Cassius relates that, not remote from this period, Agrip- 
pina, the wife of Claudius and mother of Nero, dispatched an 
officer to behead Lollia Paulina, who had been her rival for 
imperial dignity. And when the head was brought to her, 
Agrippina failed to recognize the features; but, taking the 
head into her own hands for examination, she discovered a 
certain mark on her features which had specially distinguished 
her appearance in her lifetime. 34 

« Hist, of Rome, B. lx; 84. 



106 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



8) John's Relation to Jesus. 

Josephus is careful to state that John the Baptist was a 
holy man, preached repentance unto the people, baptized unto 
„ T ,_ the remission of sins, was imprisoned by Herod 

§77. Josephus m ' r J 

and Antipas, and afterwards slain by his order ; but 
he nowhere mentions the peculiar relation exist- 
ing between Jesus and John respecting their work. Neither 
does he notice John's witness of Jesus, nor yet the testimony 
of Jesus respecting John. Edersheim expresses a conjectural 
opinion in explanation of these omissions. He says : 

" Josephus always carefully suppresses, as far as possible, all that 
refers to Christ — probably not only in accordance with his own religious 
views, but because mention of a Christ might be dangerous, certainly 
would have been inconvenient in a work written by an intense self- 
seeker, mainly for readers at Kome." 25 

Upon the other hand, Celsus admits the baptism of Jesus, 
which is the main fact in the case, and assails merely the ac- 
§78. John companying circumstances as being incredible; 
and ceisus. v j z ^ ^he appearance of the dove, and the voice 
from heaven. It is, however, merely his disbelief which he 
would oppose to the sacred record as a refutation of these cir- 
cumstances external to the baptism itself. Now, unto the 
multitudes of people John's baptism was the sign of confession 
of sin and repentance unto a better life; but unto Jesus, "who 
knew no sin," the rite was appropriated to signalize before 
mankind Christ's induction unto his Messianic ministry of sal- 
vation unto men. So John himself testifies : 

" On the morrow he [John] seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, 
Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world. This 
is He of whom I said, After me cometh a man which is become before 
me, for he was before me. And I knew him not, but that he should be 
made manifest to Israel, for this cause came I baptizing with water. 
And John bare witness saying, I have beheld the Spirit descending as a 
dove out of heaven ; and it abode upon him. And I knew him not, but he 
that sent me to baptize with water, he said unto me, Upon whomsoever 

*>Life of Jesus, I, 215. 



Historical Place of John the Baptist. 107 

thou shalt see the Spirit descending and abiding upon him, the same is 
he that baptizeth with the Holy Spirit. And I have seen and have 
borne witness that this is the Son of God." 26 

Celsus, however, assuming the fictitious character of a Jew 
addressing Jesus, 

" Attacks the account of the appearance of the Holy Spirit in the form of 
a dove at the baptism." " When you were bathing beside John, you say 
that what had the appearance of a bird from the air alighted upon 
you. . . . What credible witness beheld this appearance, or who 
heard a voice from heaven declaring you to be the Son of God?" 2T 

The relation of John and Jesus was something extraordi- 
nary, and without a parallel in history. It was not ecclesiastic 
in character, but religious, Messianic and redemp- §79 John 
tive. John was the connecting link between the and Jesus - 
two great dispensations of God with men. John's history 
would indeed be weird if considered apart from the explana- 
tion given of his mission in the Gospel. But that furnished, 
harmonizes the whole account. It was his peculiar function 
to close the prophetism of the Old Testament, while he was 
yet preparing the way for the Gospel of the ISTew Testament, 
which culminated in his rite inducting the Christ to his minis- 
try and redeeming work. Jesus said of the Baptist : 

"This is he of whom it is written, Behold I send my messenger be- 
fore thy face who shall prepare the way before thee. Verily I say unto 
you, Among them that are born of women there hath not arisen a 
greater than John the Baptist. . . . For all the prophets and the 
law prophesied until John." 28 

His place on the historic page marks the transitional point 
in the economy of the two Testaments and completes their 
unity. His special mission was realized when it was illus- 
trated in the three supreme acts of his ministry : his preparatory 
preaching of repentance, whereby he introduced the Christ to 
the apprehension of the world ; his baptism of Jesus, whereby 
he inaugurated him to his saving offices of the world ; and his 

28 John i, 29-34; comp. Matt, iii, 16, 17; Mark, i, 9-11; and Luke Iv, 1. 
27 Orig. contra Celsum, i, 40, 41. 28 Matt, xi, 10-13. 



108 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

twice-attested witness, that Jesus was the very Lamb of God 
" which taketh away the sin of the world." * 

Many circumstances centering in John's personality and 
history served to intensify the interest of the multitudes in his 
§80. John and mission. His birth as the subject of prophecy, 
the People. j^ e advent of an angel to announce the event, his 
being born of parents far advanced in years, his long silence 
in the solitudes of the wilderness, his strange appearance clad 
in " camel's hair, and a leathern girdle about his loins," who for 
food fed upon "locusts and wild honey," the earnest severity 
of his exactions in preaching, his insistence upon baptism as a 
public confession of piety, his stern courage in reproving sin 
in high places, his distinct witness that Jesus was the Messi- 
anic Redeemer from sin, his beautiful grace in retiring from 
the Christly Presence,* the abrupt termination of his work so 
soon after Christ had appeared, — these and other considera- 
tions doubtlessly deepened the impression which the Baptist 
made upon the multitudes and community at large who list- 
ened to his public utterances when he exclaimed : " I am the 
voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way 
of the Lord, as saith Isaiah the prophet." n " What wonder 
that such preaching opened countless hearts for that of the 
gospel of the kingdom of Jesus and his apostles!" ffl 

§ 81. Confirmations by Christian Writers. 

As exhibiting the history of the faith based upon the fact 
of John's life-work, brief references will be sufficient. 

a) Justin Martyr (145-150): "If John came first calling on men to 
repent while he still sat by the river Jordan, and Christ having come 
put an end to his prophesying and baptizing, and preaching also him- 
self, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand." " The law and the 
prophets were until John the Baptist." 32 

j8) Clement of Alexandria (190-200): "Who, then, is John? . . . 
John is the Forerunner and that Voice, the Precursor of the "Word; an 
inviting Voice preparing for salvation, . . . and this Voice was also 
the Precursor of the Lord's preaching glad tidings." 33 

* " He must increase, but I must decrease." (John iii, 30.) 

w John i, 29, 36. ^ John i, 23;Isa. xl, 3. 31 Van Oosterzee. 

32 Dialogue with Trypho, c. 51. w Exhortation to the Heathen, c. 1. 



Historical Place of John the Baptist. 109 

7) Tertullian (200): "Inasmuch as John is shown to be both the 
Forerunner and the Preparer of the ways of the Lord, who was to in- 
troduce the gospel and publish the kingdom of God, it follows, from 
the very fact that John has come, that Christ must be that very Being 
who was to follow his Harbinger John." 34 

5) Origen (245): " Let us, therefore, notice what he [Celsus] has to 
say by way of impugning the bodily appearance of the Holy Spirit to 
our Savior in the form of a dove." " I would like to say to Celsus, who 
represents a Jew as accepting somehow John as a Baptist, who baptized 
Jesus, that the existence of John the Baptist baptizing for the remission 
of sins is related by one who lived no great length of time after 
John and Jesus ; for in the Eighteenth Book of his Antiquities of the 
Jews, Josephus bears witness to John as having been a Baptist, and as 
promising purification to those who underwent the rite," etc. 35 

§ 82. Recorroborations in Christian Art. 

As the ministry of John culminated in that of Jesus, so the 
real point of contact and unity of their work is discoverable in 
John's baptism of Christ. It is natural, therefore, that this 
conception should illustrate itself, as it has actually done, in 
monumental frescos and mosaics in Christian Art. 

a) Among the very earliest known are two ; the one found upon 
the wall and another in the sleeping room of a crypt of Santa Lucina, 
in the Catacombs of San Calisto at Rome. The best archaeologists do not 
question that both represent the closing scene of John in his baptism of 
Jesus, the historical circumstances of which are so vividly described in 
the Gospel of Matthew. The figure in each fresco represents a man in 
the act of stepping forth from the water of the river, which reaches to 
the knee; and as he emerges, he is met by the ministrant, who is clad 
in a tunic, and stands on the shore. In both figures the symbol of the 
Holy Spirit in the form of a dove, approaching in flight from behind 
the one baptized, may be seen bearing an olive branch in his beak. 
These frescos are obviously of the same age, and bear also to each other 
a striking resemblance. This difference occurs, however: the first 
figure of the person baptized is nude, while in the second it is draped 
from the waist; also in the second, there is added a pallium or a cloak 
in place of the mere tunic worn by the ministrant in the first figure. 36 

/S) Another representation in art of the same subject in mosaics and 
frescos was found in San Giovanni in fonte, Ravenna, dating about the 
middle of the fifth century. It is placed " in the crown of the dome." 
"Christ stands in the Jordan, whose waters reach above the middle of 
the body, while John, standing on the land and holding in his left hand 

84 Adv. Marcion, B. iv, c. 33. & Orig. contr. Cels. i, 41, 47. 

36 See Bennett's Archceology, pp. 396, 398, Figs. 126, 127, 128. 



110 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

a jeweled cross, is pouring water upon the head of Christ from a shell 
in the Baptist's right hand. The symbolic dove descends directly upon 
the head of Jesus, and completes the baptismal representation." 87 

7) A fourth mosaic dating in the middle of the sixth century, was 
found in the Santa Maria, in Cosmedin, Ravenna. The appearance of 
Jesus is quite youthful, but the rough camel's-hair garment worn by 
John is plainly apparent. The subject of baptism is in water up to the 
waist, while the baptismal element is applied by the hand to the head ; 
and the dove symbol is represented as in descent and in close proximity 
to the one baptized." 38 

The evidence derived from Christian Art literature illus- 
trates three important particulars relating to the 
' dence from history of Christianity, and to the Baptist's place 

Christian Art. . , 1 , ■, • . 

in that history. 

1. The unity of the fact of John's mission in distinction 
from the accretions of the ages required to enter into the 
mythical romances representative of unhistorical traditions. 

2. The original transaction of the baptism of Jesus per- 
petuated by independent records by the evangelists, confirmed 
by Josephus and Celsus as independent proofs and continu- 
ously accepted by the Church as a capital fact connected with 
the origin of Christianity itself, and centering in the person- 
ality of Christ — constitute the best form of historical evidence. 

3. The perpetuation of the baptismal event in Christian art 
in the early ages of Christian history places beyond contradic- 
tion the antiquity and authenticity of the Scriptures which re- 
cord Christ's baptism as the initiative act to his ministry, and 
illustrate John's proper place in the historical world. 

§84. Summary. 

That the Baptist was the contemporary of Jesus whom he 
baptized is affirmed by the Evangelists ; that John was a man 
of noble virtues, whose preaching was open to the public, im- 
posing "righteousness toward one another and piety towards 
God;" that he was imprisoned by Herod Antipas at Ma- 

87 Bennett's Archceology, p. 404, Fig. 132. ™ lb. p. 405, Fig. 133. 



Historical Place of John the Baptist. Ill 

chaerus, and by his order put to death, are so many facts 
attested by Josephus, the famous historian of the Jews. As to 
the antiquity of John's life, the destructive critic, Strauss, ad- 
mits the absolute correctness of Luke's chronology. It was 
not, of course, the purpose or function of the enemies of Chris- 
tianity to record John's special relation to Jesus; yet Celsus 
distinctly concedes and assumes that John did baptize the 
Lord, and even notes with a taunt the circumstance of the 
dove, the symbol of the Holy Spirit descending and abiding 
upon Jesus at his baptism. The baptismal rite itself could 
have no other characteristic or function than to inaugurate 
Christ's great ministry of teaching, self -manifestation, and 
redemption, as taught by evangelist and apostle, confirmed by 
the teaching and testimony of Justin Martyr, Clement of Al- 
exandria, Tertullian of Carthage, and Origen of Egypt and 
Palestine, and illustrated in Christian art. The chain of evi- 
dence is complete for the first seven hundred years from the 
beginning of the Christian era. Not only were John and 
Jesus individually historical characters and contemporaries, 
but both are at a remove from the mythical conceits of modern 
criticism, whose relation to each other is substantiated as af- 
firmed in the several Gospels. 



GHAPTEE V. 

THE HISTOKICAL CHKIST AND ANCIENT 
CHRISTIANITY. 

I. The Christ of Christianity. 
II. The Doctrines of Christianity. 

III. The Institutions of Christianity. 

IV. The Christianity of Christ. 

113 



Chapter V. 

THE HISTOKICAL CHKIST AND ANCIENT 
CHKISTIANITY. 

§85. Sources: Biographical Epitomes, and Literature. 

1. Lucian (120-200) was born in Samosata, Syria, and flourished in the 

reign of Trajan (98-117). He has been characterized as " a bril- 
liant but frivolous rhetorician," " an epicurean, worldling, and in- 
fidel, . . . who could see in Christianity only one of the 
vagaries and follies of mankind ; in miracles only jugglery ; in the 
belief of immortality an empty dream ; and in contempt of death 
and brotherly love of Christians ... a silly enthusiasm." 
(Schaff.) In a letter to one Chronis, under the guise of a narrative, 
he represents as a Christian the death of one Proteus or Pere- 
grinus, and assails the Christians and their religion with wit and 
ridicule. It is a parody and fiction. Lucian, however, admits 
that, in his times, the Christian people were worshipers of Christ. 
His testimony will be given at different points as it may be appro- 
priate. 

2. Tacitus (d. 110) was a Roman historian of fame "who ranks, beyond 

dispute, in the highest place among men of letters of all ages, 
who lived in the latter half of the first, and in the early part of the 
second century of our era." His two historical works known now 
as History and Annals were originally but one work, and cover a 
period from A. D. 14 to 68. "An attempt has recently been made 
to prove that the Annals are a forgery by Poggio Bracciolini, an 
Italian scholar of the fifteenth century ; but their genuinenees is 
confirmed by the agreement in various minute details with coins and 
inscriptions discovered since that period. [Besides] Rudolphus, a 
monk of the monastery of Fulda, in Hesse-Cassel, writing in the 
ninth century, says that Cornelius Tacitus speaks of a river known 
as the Weser or the Yisurgis. In the Annals, as they have come 
down to us, we find the Visurgis mentioned five times in the first 
two books ; whence we conclude that a manuscript of them was in 
existence in the ninth century. Add to this the testimony of 
Jerome [A. D. 345-420], that Tacitus wrote in thirty books the 
lives of the Caesars, and the evidence of style, and there can not 
be much doubt that in the Annals we have a genuine work of 
Tacitus." "Much of the history of that period must have been 

115 



116 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

obscure and locked up in the emperor's private papers and 
memoranda. . . . Tacitus, as a man of good social position, 
no doubt had access to the best information, and must have talked 
matters over with the most eminent men of the day." (Encyclo- 
paedia Britannica, Vol. IX, 9th ed., p. 25; Phil'a. See Annals 
xv, 44.) 

3. Clement of Eome, the earliest of the Apostolic Fathers, otherwise 

known as the immediate pupils and successors of the apostles. 
Clement is said to have succeeded Linus, as second Bishop of 
Eome, in the year 67, or Cletus (Anacletus) as third Bishop, in 
91, holding the office for nine years, and died in 100. He wrote 
a letter in the name of the whole Church at Rome to the Co- 
rinthians to compose certain dissensions among them about the 
authorities placed over them by the appointment of the apostles. 
It was written either about 64, or soon after the persecution 
of Nero, or in 94, or 95, just after the persecutions under Domi- 
tian. He is placed in the catalogue of martyrs ; but it is quite as 
probable that he died a natural death in the third year of the 
reign of Trajan, A. D. 100. He is understood to be identical with 
the person referred to by Paul, who mentions " Clement also, and 
with other my fellow-laborers, whose names are in the Book of Life." 
(Philipp. iv, 3.) He cites passages from the Gospels of Matthew 
and Luke ; also from Paul's Epistles. 

4. Aristides (Marcianus) was a philosopher of Athens mentioned by 

Eusebius (E. H. iv, c. 3) as the contemporary of Quadratus. He 
describes him as a "faithful man of our religion, who left an 
Apology of our Faith, as Quadratus did, addressed to Hadrian 
(who reigned 117-138). Jerome confirms Eusebius, and relates 
that after Aristides became a Christian, he still continued to wear 
the garb of a philosopher, and that he presented to Hadrian " a 
book containing an account of our sect ; that is, an Apology for the 
Christians, which is still extant, a monument with the learned of 
his ingenuity." (Be Illustribus Viris, I, 20.) 

This work of Aristides was lost for many centuries, but was 
recently discovered in complete form. An Armenian translation 
found in 1878 was the first document covering the Apology brought 
to light. This copy Penan, with his characteristic repugnance to 
Christianity, at once denounced as spurious. But in 1889, Rendel 
Harris, of Philadelphia, while traveling in Syria, discovered at St. 
Catherine, at Mt. Sinai, a Syrian manuscript containing a transla- 
tion of the long lost Apology of Aristides. Its accordancy with 
the Armenian document is such as completely substantiates the 
identity and authenticity of this Apology. But there is a curious 
discrepancy in that the Syrian MS. makes it clear that the docu- 
ment was addressed to Antoninus Pius (emperor 139-161) instead 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 117 

of Hadrian (117-138), according to the Armenian document, 
Eusebius, and Jerome. "Now, this name is otherwise known 
as that of a Christian of great authority in Smyrna, living about 
A. D. 138-140." (Cruttwell, Literary Hist, of Early Christianity, 
Vol. I, 292.) This whole Apology was found to have been trans- 
ferred into an old Latin romance found at Vienna by Armitage 
Kobinson, editor of the " Cambridge Texts and Studies contribut- 
ing to the illustration of Biblical Literature." The romance was 
designated History of Barlaam and Joseph (or Josephat) . Aristides's 
Apology contains an early formulation of the "Apostles' Creed," 
though not quite complete. 

5. Porphyry was a Phoenician, born at Tyre, about 233, in the reign of 
Alexander Severus, and is said to have descended from a noble 
ancestry who were kings. His name means purple, which was the 
kingly robe. Jerome and Chrysostom call his name Bataneotes. 
In the Ecclesiastical History of Socrates he is said to have once 
been a Christian, but that having received a beating by some 
Christians in Palestine, he apostatized out of resentment and 
mortification. About A. D. 270, Porphyry wrote a work against 
the Christians in fifteen books, only fragments of which are now 
extant. Apollinaris of Syria elaborately refuted Porphyry's work. 
A letter of Censtantine, written soon after the Council of Nice in 
325, refers to " Porphyry, that enemy of true piety, who has re- 
ceived a fit reward for his impious writings against religion, so 
that he is made infamous to all future times, and covered with 
reproach, and his impious writings have been destroyed" Never- 
theless, in 449, by the edict of Theodosius the Younger, Porphyry's 
writings were abolished ; which would indicate that some copies 
had escaped the flames. (See also Eusebius, Eccl. Hist. VI, c. 
19, pp. 224, 225.) His fragments against the Christians which 
remain are of evidential value and service now in respect to the 
early origin and historicity of the New Testament. 

8. Pliny the Younger (61-116) was nephew of Pliny the elder, who 
was the author of a work on Natural History. The junior Pliny 
was adopted into the imperial family by his uncle, and educated 
to be an advocate of the law. He was born of noble ancestry. 
He studied rhetoric under the best masters of Kome, among 
whom was Quintilian. It is related that he composed a Greek 
tragedy in his youth, and that he spoke at the forum at the age 
of nineteen. He had also notable friends. Tacitus and he were 
intimates and correspondents, and Pliny became a great favorite 
with the Emperor Trajan. During the last decade of the first 
century he was appointed to a number of public offices in the 
empire, and seems to have conducted their affairs with success 
and approval. He occupied the position of proconsul of Bithynia 



118 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

and Pontus in Asia Minor, 109-111 A. D. He was the author of 
ten books, the last of which contains his famous correspondence 
with the emperor respecting the persecutions of the Christians resi- 
dent in the province which he ruled. His testimony is invaluable. 

7. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (Emp. 161-180) was a Stoic philosopher, 

born at the capital 121 A. D., and died 180. He was well edu- 
cated. Antoninus Pius, his predecessor in the imperial office, 
adopted him in his family. His philosophy as a Stoic disqualified 
him to understand the character and sufferings of the Christians, 
whose religion he treated with scorn. Apologies were tendered 
to him as emperor by Melito, Miltiades, Athanagoras, and others, 
in behalf of his Christian subjects, on account of the persecutions 
which raged during his reign. He was devoted to the gods of 
the State. Believing that at death we are absorbed into the 
essence of the Deity, he utterly rejected the Christian doctrine 
of immortality. Dr. Jortin observes: " The Emperor Marcus was 
prejudiced against the Christians, and in his book . . . cen- 
sures very unreasonably what he ought to have approved, — this 
readiness and resolution to die for their religion/' (Truth of the 
Christian Religion, p. 57.) Aurelius wrote: "What a soul that is 
which is ready if at any moment it must be separated from the body, 
and is ready either to be extinguished, or dispersed, or continued 
to exist; but only so that this readiness [to die] comes from a 
man's own judgment not from sheer obstinacy as with the Christians, 
[/iTj Kara ipCkty Trapdra^iv, literally, "Not according to naked dis- 
cipline as with the Christians"], but considerately and with 
dignity, and in a way to persuade another without scenic display 
arpayipdu)?, untragically , without noise or fuss. (Meditat. xi, 3.) 

Dr. Philip Schaff remarks: "The empire was visited at that 
time by a number of conflagrations, a destructive flood of the 
Tiber, an earthquake, insurrections, and particularly a pestilence 
which spread from Ethiopia to Gaul. This gave rise to bloody 
persecutions in which the government and people united against 
the enemies of the gods and the supposed authors of these mis- 
fortunes." (Hist. Christ. Church, Vol. II, 55.) 

8. Constantine the Great (247-337), the first Christian emperor of the 

Roman Empire. Though favorable to Christianity, he did not 
himself profess to be a Christian until a week before his death, 
when he was baptized. By degrees he introduced the Christian 
religion as the religion of the State, between A. D. 311 and 325. 
" The first Edict of Toleration, A. D. 311, made an end of persecu- 
tions ; the second Edict of Toleration, 313 (there was no third), 
prepared the way for legal recognition and protection ; the Nicene 
Council, 325, marks the solemn inauguration of the imperial State 
Church." (Schaff's Hist. Christ. Church, Vol. II, Preface, p. 5.) 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 119 

9. Didache, or the " Teaching of the Twelve Apostles," written A. D. 

70-100. This is a most interesting document in Christian crit- 
icism. Its opening sentence reads: "Teaching of the Lord by the 
Twelve Apostles to the Nations." Its evidential value is of supreme 
importance. For full description of the document and its con- 
tents, see Appendix, Excursus D. 

10. John Stuart Mill was of Scottish blood, born at London in 1806. 

He pursued his collegiate studies solely under the instructions 
of his own father, and early mastered the classics and higher 
mathematics. He says of himself that he could not remember 
the time when he could not read Greek ; but was told that he be- 
gan the study when he was but three years old ! Unquestionably 
Mill possessed an extraordinarily precocious mind. He seems to 
have been as remarkable for the utter deficiency of a religious 
nature. He claimed to have never had a religious belief. Ac- 
cordingly he was a practical Atheist. His best known works are 
his Autobiography, and his Three Essays on Theism. His death oc- 
curred in 1873. Among his last utterances was this: 

"About the life and sayings of Jesus there is a stamp of origin- 
ality, combined with a profundity of insight, which, if we abandon 
the idle expectation of finding scientific precision where something 
very different was aimed at, must place the Prophet of Nazareth, 
even in the estimation of those who have no belief in his inspira- 
tion, in the very first rank of men of sublime genius of whom our 
species can boast. . . . Nor even now would it be easy even 
for an unbeliever to find a better translation of the rule of virtue 
from the abstract into the concrete than to endeavor so to live that 
Christ would approve our life." 

The Christ and Christianity. 

Eabbi, we know that thou art a Teacher come from God. — Nicodemus. 

The teachings of Jesus carried forward morality to the sublimest point 
attained or attainable by humanity. The influence of spiritual 
religion has been rendered doubly great by the unparalleled purity 
and elevation of his own character. — "Supernatural Religion" 
(Anonymous) . 

Repose now in thy glory, noble Founder ! Fear no more to see the edi- 
fice of thy labors fall by any fault. Thou shalt become the Corner- 
stone of humanity so entirely that to tear thy name from this 
world would rend it to its foundation. — Renan. 

Yes, if the life and death of Socrates were those of a sage, the life and 
death of Jesus were those of a God ; and the history of Socrates, 
which no one doubts, is not as well attested as that of Jesus 
Christ. — Rousseau. 



120 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

It is reserved for Christianity to present to the world an ideal character 
which, through all the ages of eighteen centuries, has inspired 
the hearts of men with an impassioned love, has shown itself capa- 
ble of acting on all ages, nations, temperaments, and conditions. 
. . . In three short years of his active life, Jesus has done more 
to regenerate and soften mankind than all the disquisitions of 
philosophers and all the exhortations of moralists. — Leckt. 

As little as humanity will ever be without religion, as little will it be 
without Christ ; for to have religion without Christ is absurd. . . . 
And this Christ, so far as he is separable from the highest style of 
religion, is historical, not mythical. — Steauss. 

It is no use to say that Christ as exhibited in the Gospels is not his- 
torical.— J. S. Mill. 

ARGUMENT. 

Jesus Christ being inducted into his unique ministry by baptism, leads 
to the consideration of his special function as the great Teacher of 
men, and the Founder of Christianity. In these offices he has 
been distinctly recognized by both friends and foes of the Christian 
religion. That the system which originated in him had an histor- 
ical basis is evidenced, not only by universal testimony, but by the 
very doctrines he taught and by the institutions he founded, which 
have been perpetuated through all the ages since, and transmitted 
to us. We now find them to be identical with the tenets main- 
tained throughout Christendom. By such means the historical an- 
tiquity and authenticity of the Christian religion are demonstrated. 

1. The Christ of Christianity. 

2. The Doctrines of Christianity. 

3. The Institutions of Christianity. 

4. The Christianity of Christ. 

THE UNIQUE MINISTRY OF CHRIST. 

As Jesus himself was not a sinner, 1 it is not needful that he 
should be baptized as others were, to make public confession of 
6 se His in- sm anc ^ reformation of life. John's surprise and 
auguration. hesitation to perform the rite in this case was 
most natural. He said, " I have need to be baptized of thee, 
and comest thou to me/" Jesus replied, "Suffer it to be so 
now, for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness. Then 
he suffered him." 2 What wrought this change in the con- 
sciousness and purpose of John? Obviously he discovered a 
deeper and special sense in the words, "It becometh us to fulfill 

I John, viii, 46; 1 Pet. i, 19; ii, 22; 2 Cor. v, 21; Heb. iv,15. * Matt, lii, 14, 15. 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 121 

all righteousness" as apart from the confession of sin. The 
rite administered by the Forerunner as an initiative act would 
serve to place Jesus in public recognition by his example, as 
within touch and sympathy with all who were truly penitent ; 
the "One who taketh away the sin of the world;" and by the 
Spirit's descent upon him in the form of a dove, and the voice 
from heaven announcing him as the " well-beloved Son," would 
complete the identification, and emphasize the fact that Jesus 
was hereby entering upon his Messianic ministry. 

Christ united in himself all the functions of a leader of 
thought, a teacher of truth, and a preacher of righteousness. 
These high qualities he so exampled as to justify 
their recognition by both friends and foes of tionsofHis 
Christianity. This fact finds support, if not abso- MimstI 'y- 
lute verification on the part of inveterate enemies, in Christ's 
life as well as in the first centuries after his death; and their 
testimony may be cited, not because their opinions of Jesus 
are evidential, but because their concessions of fact a/re invalu- 
able. His instructions were so original and forceful — so unlike 
the scribes' — so powerful in address, so lasting in impression, 
that his teaching was an astonishment to the people. When 
Jesus had concluded his discourse upon the mountains, "the 
multitudes were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them 
as one having authority, and not as the scribes." When the 
officers of the Sanhedrin were sent to arrest Jesus, they returned 
without the intended prisoner, saying, "Never man so spake." 3 

Celsus especially makes much of Jesus in respect to the three 
functions of his ministry: as a Leader, Teacher, §88# j esugas 
and Preacher. He assumes rather than affirms a Leader, 
these functions and prerogatives as characteristics of Christ's 
work. He says : 

"No good general and leader . . . was ever betrayed, nor even a 
wicked captain of robbers/' . . . [but] Jesus, failing to acquire 
"the good-will" of his disciples, proved himself inferior to "a brigand 
chief!" 4 "If you should tell them that Jesus is not the Son of 

8 John vii, 46. 4 Origen adv. Celsum, ii, 12. 



122 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



God . . . they would not consent to discontinue their worship of 
him who is their Leader in the sedition." 5 " For they descend from the 
same original, and they have received their Master and Leader from the 
same country, and yet have revolted from the Jews." 6 

Origen, replying to Celsus, says : 

"Celsus. . . . proceeds . . . to speak of our Savior as having 
been the Leader of our generation in so far as we are Christians." 7 

Suetonius, also referring to Christ's leadership, says : 

" Claudius banished from Rome those who were continually making 
disturbances, Christ being their Leader." 8 

Celsus and others refer to Jesus also as the great Teacher of 
the Christian world. He says: 

Christ's associates "shared all things in common, and had him for 

their Teacher who was deemed to be a Savior and Son of the greatest 

God." 9 "In the next place, those who were his associates 

§89. Jesus as w hij e alive, and who listened to his voice, and enjoyed his 
TsEiclier 

instructions, on seeing him subjected to death," 10 etc. 

"Let us pass over the refutations which he adduced against the claims 

of their Teacher." 11 "A few years ago he began to teach this doctrine, 

being regarded as the Son of God." 

Origen, replying, says : Christ " our Superintendent, then, 
and Teacher, having come forth from the Jews, regulates the 
whole world by the word of his teaching;" 12 and Josephus 
mentions "Jesus, a wise man, ... a Teacher of such as 
receive the truth with pleasure." 13 

Celsus thus refers to the preaching of our Lord : 

"While he was in the body and no one believed on him, he preached 

to all without intermission." 14 "The man of Nazareth promulgated 

laws quite opposed to these [of Moses], declaring that no 

§ 90. Jesus as one can come ^ ^he Father who loves power, or riches, 

PrGfljCtiGr 

or glory ; that men ought not to be more careful in pro- 
viding food than the ravens ; that they were to be less concerned about 
their raiment than the lilies ; that to him who has given them one blow, 
they should offer to receive another." 15 

The testimonies of Celsus, Suetonius, and Origen concur 
in representing Jesus Christ as the great Leader of men; of 
Celsus, Josephus, and Origen as their greatest Teacher ; while 

b Origen adv. Celsum, viii, 14. • 76., v. 38 ; Lard, vii, 254. i lb., i, 26. 

» Life of Claudius, 25. » Cels., ii, 9. w lb., ii, 45. « lb., v, 52. 

»JT6., i, 26; v, 33. ™Ant., xviii, 3, 3. " Cels., ii, 70. « J6., vii, 18. 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 123 

Celsus alone, with some perversity and prejudice, clearly con- 
cedes and substantiates the fact of his preaching, by referring 
directly to points and passages found in Christ's Sermon on the 
Mount. These qualities and characteristics, then, sufficiently 
represent his ministry. But this is not all. It is conceivable 
at least that Jesus might have led men, taught the truth, and 
preached salvation, without securing any permanent success in 
the world. John, in a more restricted sense, exercised these 
same prerogatives, but left no system behind him. 

But Jesus was the Founder of Christianity. Powerfully did 
he reason with men; but he wrote no books to perpetuate the 
argument. Yet he wrought the deepest and most § 01 Jesu8 ^ 
enduring convictions in the spiritual nature, — Founder, 
convictions of sinfulness, of escape made certain; and to the 
believing he brought a present comfort in cleansing, and for 
the future a boundless hope of happiness in the life after death. 
That Christ did found the religion which bears his name, is 
that which is either affirmed or conceded by adversaries, both 
ancient and modern. 

a) Tacitus testifies that — 

"Christ, the Founder op that name, had been put to death as a 
criminal by Pontius Pilate, the procurator of Judaea, in the reign of 
Tiberius [Caesar]." 16 

/S) Lucian: "They therefore still worship that great man who was 
crucified in Palestine, because he introduced into the world this new religion. 
Moreover, their first Lawgiver taught them that they are all brethren 
when once they have turned and renounced the gods of the Greeks, and 
worship that Master of theirs who was crucified, and engage to live ac- 
cording to his laws." 17 

y) Among the modern rationalists and adversaries of Chris- 
tianity is Strauss, who says : 

"As little as humanity will be without religion, as little will it be 
without Christ. . . . He remains the highest model of religion 
within the range of our thought ; and no perfect piety is possible with- 
out his presence in the heart. To the historical person of Christ be- 
longs all in his life that exhibits his religious perfection, his religious 
discourses, his moral action, and his [wonderful] passion." 18 

M Annals, xv, 44. 1T Peregrinus, cited by Lard, vii, 279, 280. 

^Essay, in Amer. Tract Society, p. 308. 



124 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

8) Lecky, a rationalist skeptic, but one of the fairest and 

ablest of modern historians, says : 

" It may be truly said that the simple record of three short years of 
[Christ's] active life has done more to regenerate and soften mankind 
than all the disquisitions of philosophers and all the exhortations of 
moralists. This has indeed been the wellspring of whatever is best and 
purest in Christian life. And amid all the sins and failings, amid all 
the priestcraft and persecution and fanaticism that have defaced the 
Church, it has preserved, in the character and example of its Foundeb, 
an enduring principle of regeneration." 19 

c) Kenan addresses this apostrophe to Jesus at his sep- 

ulcher: 

"Repose now in thy glory, noble Founder! Fear no more to see 
the edifice of thy labors fall by any fault. Henceforth, beyond the 
reach of human frailty, thou shalt witness from the heights of divine 
peace the infinite results of thy acts. ... A thousand times more alive, 
a thousand times more beloved, since thy death than during thy passage 
here below, thou shalt become the corner-stone of humanity so entirely, 
that to tear thy name from this world, would be to rend it to its founda- 
tions. Between thee and God there is no longer any distinction ! Com- 
plete Conquerer of Death ! take possession of thy kingdom, whither shall 
follow thee, by the royal road which thou hast traced, ages of wor- 
shipers!" 20 

§ 92. Confirmations by Ancient Christian Writers. 

1. Clement of Rome, the contemporary and fellow-laborer of Paul, 
says: "The apostles received the gospel for us from the Lord Jesus 
Christ." 21 

2 Aristides (123) : " The Christians reckon the beginning of their re- 
ligion from Jesus Christ, who is named the Son of God, the Most High." M 

3. Tertullian (200) : " Tiberius, accordingly, in whose days the 
Christian name made its entry into the world. . . . We date the origin 
of our religion, as we have before mentioned, from the reign of Tiberius. 
We have set forth this origin of our sect and name, with this account of 
the founder of Christianity ." * 

The historical evidence of the beginning of Christianity 
needs to be traversed no further to find its Founder. This line 
of proof substantiates the character and functions engaged in 
Christ's Messianic ministry: His leadership, by which so many 
people coming in contact were immediately attracted to his 

» Hist Europ. Morals, Eng. ed. ii, 9. ™Life of Christ, 1866, p. 351. 

21 Lightfoot's transl. of Epls. to Cor., c. 42. 

22 Apology, first ed. 23 Tertull., Apology, cc. 5, 7, 21. 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 125 

person and became his followers; his teaching, by means of 
which they were instructed in all spiritual truth as the Kevealer 
of God; \ns preaching, by which he appealed to their spiritual 
conscience and inspired the believing with the new hope of 
life and immortality brought to light through the Gospel. 
The Christian writers adduced, not only confirm the testimony 
of the ancient adversaries, but carry back those same facts 
through the line of Christian history to the very apostles, and 
recognize Jesus Christ as their Divine Source. Modern criti- 
cisms of the rationalistic and destructive school reach the same 
conclusion, and do not hesitate to exalt and glorify Jesus as 
the Founder of the Christian faith. Even the mention of 
Jesus thus in relation to his work, without any attempt to 
refute the facts, which rather the adversaries fully concede, 
makes powerfully for the antiquity of the period, the authen- 
ticity of the account, and the historicity of the Gospels. 

The Doctrines of Christianity. 

"We pass from the Ministry of Christ to his Doctrines. It 
is evident that the pagan writers of that period had also 
remarkable familiarity with the Christian teachings. Their 
frequent reference to them, even derisively, proves, from their 
standpoint of disbelief, that the Christian doctrines synchro- 
nize with Christ and his apostles, and that the teachings of 
to-day are identical with those of the New Testament. These 
may be briefly indicated. 

a) Celsus : " You, sincere believers, find fault with us, because we 
do not recognize this individual [Christ] as God, nor agree with you that 
he endured these [sufferings] for the benefit of mankind. 
It was to sinners that God has been sent;" "who was §93. Benefits* 
deemed to be a Savior, and the Son of the greatest God." Death. 

"lam God ; or I am the Son of God. ... I have come 
because the world is perishing ; and you, O men, are perishing for your 
iniquities. But I wish to save you ; and ye shall see me returning again 
with heavenly power. Blessed is he who does me homage." " O Jews 
and Christians, no God nor Son of God, either came or will come down 



* On Benefits of Christ's Death, etc. See Rom. iii, 26; v, 6, 8, 11; xiv, 8, 9; 2 Cor. 
v, 15; 1 Cor. xv, 3; 1 Thess. v, 10; i, 10; Tit. ii, 14; Gal. iv, 4, 5. 



126 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

[from heaven] to mankind. 24 Again if God, like Jupiter in the comedy, 
should, on awakening from his lengthened slumber, desire to rescue the 
human race from evil, why did he send this Spirit, of which you speak, 
into one corner [of the earth]? ... Do you not think that you have 
made the Son of God more ridiculous in sending him to the Jews ?" ^ 

jS) Toledoth Jeshu says that Jesus taught that his blood atoned for 
the sins of mankind ; that he created the heavens and the earth and all 
they contain ; that he appropriated to himself the fifty-third chapter of 
Isaiah: " He was wounded for our transgressions; he was bruised 
for our iniquities, ,, etc. He also applied to himself Psalm cxt "The 
Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand until I make thine 
enemies thy footstool," etc. 

7) Porphyry ; " If Christ, as he says, be the way of salvation and the 
life, and only they who believe on him can be saved, what became of the 
men who lived before his coming ?" 26 

Celsus: "Also, those who are long since dead which will arise from 
the earth clothed with the self -same flesh [as during this life ] ; for such 
a hope is simply one which might be cherished by worms" 27 
§94. Re ^" " For, what sort of a soul is that which would still long 
Human Body.* * or a D °cly that has been subject to corruption ? Whence 
also this opinion of yours [which] is not shared by some 
of the Christians, and they pronounce it to be exceeding vile and loath- 
some, and impossible ? For what kind of a body is that which, after 
being completely corrupted, can return to its original nature, and to that 
self-same first condition out of which it fell into dissolution? Being 
unable to return any answer, they betake themselves to a most absurd 
refuge ; viz., that all things are possible to God." 28 

Lucian: "For these miserable men have no doubt 

teht^ftne" that they 8haU be immortal and live forever. There- 
Human Spirit. fore tne y contemn death, and many surrender them- 
selves to sufferings." 29 
Celsus: " But my prophet once declared in Jerusalem that the Son 
of God will come as the Judge of the righteous, and Punisher of the 
wicked." 30 " And those who know not the punishments 
§96. Judg- -^hich await them will repent and grieve in vain; while 
World. those who are faithful to me, I will preserve eternally, 
. . . but they give occasion to every fool or impostor to 
apply them to suit his own purposes." 31 

Porphyry: " Christ threatens everlasting punishment 

§97. Final to those who do not believe in him; and yet in another 

of the Incor- P^ ace he sa y s > ' With what measure ye mete, it shall be 

rigible. measured to you again/ which is absurd and contradic- 

tory ; for all measures must be limited to time." 32 



*Rom. viii,ll, 22, 23; Philip, iii, 21; Eph. v, 23. 

a Cels. 11,38; iii, 62; ii, 9; vii, 9; v, 2, 3. 26 Cels. vi, 78. 

« Cited by Lard, vii, 439; cf. John xiv, 6. 2T Cels. v, 14, (tkuX^kuv iXirls. 

a« Cels. v, 14; comp. Matt. xix,26; Mark x, 27. » Lard, vii, 280. 

80 Cels. i, 49. KCels. vii, 9. sa La rd . v ii, 440, 441. 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 127 

Celsus: "It is folly on their part to suppose that when God, as if 
he were a cook, introduces the fire [which is to consume § gs. Confla- 
the world ] , all the rest of the human race will be burned gration of the 
up, while they [the good] alone will remain. ' On all Last r)ay - 
the rest will I send down eternal fire, both on cities and on countries.' " M 

Many of these representations of Christian doctrine are 
extremely crude, or much perverted, or both. Nevertheless, 
these adversaries were untrained in Christian truth, and very 
hostile to the Christian faith. But, despite these faulty repre- 
sentations, the direct references to the doctrines themselves 
prove the earlier antiquity and historicity of these teachings 
found in the New Testament. 

Institutions of Christianity. 

a) Julian: " That some of those [Christians] who at the beginning 
received the word from Paul were such, is apparent from what Paul him- 
self says writing to them : . . . 'And you are not ignorant, 
brethren, that such were you also. But ye are washed; f Baptism 6 
but ye were sanctified in the name of Jesus Christ.' " M 
"You see [that he says that] they were washed, having been washed 
and scoured with water that penetrates even to the soul. And baptism 
which can not heal the leprosy, nor the gout, nor the dysentery, nor any 
other distemper of the body, takes away adulteries, extortions, and all 
other sins of the soul !" M " Whosoever is a ravisher, a murderer, guilty 
of sacrilege, or any other abomination, let him come boldly, for when I 
have washed him with this water I will immediately make him clean and 
innocent; and if he commits the same crimes again, I will make him as 
clean as before, after he has thumped his breast and beat his head !" 36 

" I desire not to hear so much of any service of yours, as that you 
have expelled the wicked Athanasius [a Christian bishop, A. D. 326] out 
of Egypt, who, under my government, has been so audacious as to per- 
suade Greek women, wives of illustrious men, to receive baptism !" 37 

B) The Didache or the invaluable document, 

. § 100. Confir- 

titled The Teaching of the Apostles,* which dates mation by the 

A. D. 70-100, furnishes absolute confirmation of Didache - 

the fact and early usage of baptism as a Christian institution : 

" But concerning baptism, thus shall ye baptize : Having first recited 
all these things, baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and 
of the Holy Spirit, in living [i. e., running] water. But if thou hast not 



*Matt. xxviii, 19; Mark xvi, 16; Acts 11, 41; vlli, 38; ix, 18; x, 47,48; xvl, 15, 33; 
and 1 Cor. 1, 13-16; Gal. iii, 27. 

33 Cels. v, 14; vll, 9. 34 1 Cor. vl, 9-11. &Lard. vii, 634, 635. 

se Julian (in Lard, vii, 636) . 37 Epis. to Ecditius, praef ect of Egypt, in Lard, vii, 644. 
9 



128 Historical Evidence op the New Testament 

living water, then baptize in other water ; and if thou art not able in 
cold, then in warm [water]. But if thou hast neither, then pour 38 water 
on the head thrice, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of 
the Holy Spirit." 39 

Pliny the Younger (110) obviously refers to the adminis- 
§101. The tration of the LordSs Supper as the usage of the 
Lord's supper, primitive Church, observed on the Lord's day: 

" They [the Christians] were accustomed to meet on a stated day 
before it was light, and sing a hymn of praise to Christ as God ; to bind 
themselves by an oath for the non-perpetration of any wickedness. . . . 
After this they were accustomed to separate, and then reassemble to eat a 
harmless meal." 40 

a) Tertullian (200): "Before daybreak in congrega- 
a'tions " ^ ons we ta ^ e ^ rom tne hand of none but the presidents, 
the sacrament of the Eucharist which the Lord commanded 
to be eaten at meal-times, and enjoined to be taken by all alike." 41 

/3) Irenseus (178): "And in this state of affairs they held fellowship 
with each other, and Anicetus conceded to Polycarp, in the church, the 
celebration of the Eucharist, by showing him respect." * 

y) Justin Martyr (147) : "Those who are called by us deacons give 
to each of those present to partake of the bread and wine, mixed with 
water, over which the thanksgiving was pronounced ; and to those who 
were absent they carry away a portion. And this food is called amongst 
us the Eucharist* of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who 
believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been 
washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins and unto 
regeneration, and who is so living as Christ enjoined." 43 

S) Ignatius (110): "Take heed, then, to have but one Eucharist. 
For there is [but] one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup to 
[show forth] the unity of his blood. 44 Let that be deemed a proper 
Eucharist which is [administered] either by the bishop, or by one to 
whom he has intrusted it." * 

e) Didache (70-100): " But as touching the Eucharistic thanksgiving, 
give ye thanks thus — first as regards the cup: 'We give thanks, O our 
Father, for the holy vine of thy Son David, that thou 
flrmatiorT 11 " ^^ st make known to us through thy Son Jesus. Thine is 
the glory for ever and ever.' Then as regards the broken 
bread: 'We give thanks, O our Father, for the life and knowledge which 
thou didst make known to us, through thy Son Jesus. Thine is the glory 
for ever and ever. As this broken bread was scattered upon the moun- 
tains, and being gathered together became one, so may thy Church be 

*Euxa/ucrWa, Thanksgiving. 

38 "EKxeop^to pour out, to shed, etc. ^Didache, or Teachings of the Apostles, c. 7. 
40 Official Epis. to Emp. Trajan. «De Corona, c. 3. ^Fragments, c. 3. 

&First Apology, cc. 65, 66. « Epis. to Phila., 4. 

45 Epis. to Smyrneans, 9. 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 129 

gathered together from the ends of the earth into thy kingdom. For 
thine is the glory and power through Jesus Christ, for ever and ever.' " 
"And on the Lord's-day gather yourselves together and break bread, 
and give thanks, first confessing your transgressions, that your sacrifice 
may be pure." 46 

On the Eucharist, Dr. Philip Schaff makes the following- 
pointed remark : 

" The Lord's Supper was universally regarded, not only as a sacra- 
ment, but also as a sacrifice ; the true and eternal sacrifice of the New 
Covenant, superseding all the provisional and typical sacrifices of the 
Old ; taking the place particularly of the Passover, or the Feast of the 
typical Redemption from Egypt." 47 

Following the brief intimation given by Pliny of the exist- 
ent usage of the primitive Christians, who met on a specific 
day to observe the Lord's Supper, which he men- ^ 104 
tions as " a harmless meal," the ground traversed Resume, 
is that of the first two centuries, taken, however, in the reverse 
order of the chronology in order to connect the established 
usage with that of the apostles. An inspection of the testi- 
monies develops that at the beginning, as was most natural, 
instructions were given concerning the nature of the Eucha- 
rist, its administrators, and the method of its administration, 
establishing thus from the beginning this usage of Christian- 
ity. Tertullian mentions the fact that the Christians did 
assemble before daylight, as Pliny affirms, and on the Lord's 
command all alike partook of the supper called the Eucharist. 
Irenaeus indicates the characteristic of Christian fellowship and 
the proper respect due the administrator. Justin represents 
the manner of the administration and the character requisite 
in the recipients. Ignatius explains the nature of the feast. 
The Teaching of the Apostles enjoins the service of the early 
Church and the method to he observed in the remembrance and 
honoring of Jesus Christ its Founder. Thus we are brought 
back to the apostolic usage in the Apostolic Age. It remains 
to be remarked that the two institutions — baptism and the 
Lord's Supper — being identified with the origin of Chris- 

^Didaehe, c. 9, 14. « Hist. Christ. Church, Vol. II, 245. See 1 Cor. v, 7. 



130 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

tianity, are themselves monuments in evidence of the antiquity 
of the Christian religion, and of those Scriptures whose con- 
tents gave an account of these two institutions. 48 

THE INSTITUTION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 

The Christian Sabbath-day, which commemorates the 

resurrection of Christ, happened to coincide with Sun-day on 

o-,^= ™. • the Koman calendar, the day dedicated to the 

§ 105. Chris- ' J 

tianity and the worship of the Sun. Familiarity with the name 
of that day renders it easy to understand how the 
Christians came to call their sacred rest day " Sunday." Nev- 
ertheless, it is a heathen designation and without authority 
from the Scriptures. The apostles themselves never so named 
the Christian Sabbath, but uniformly referred to it as "the 
first day of the week® or " the LoroVs day" n which indicates its 
purpose. This accordancy in observing the same day by both 
heathen and Christian peoples, though for different reasons, 
explains why the Christians excited no surprise in the minds 
of their heathen neighbors, that their writers should not give 
the Sabbath special mention. However, Pliny, when govern- 
ing Bithynia and Pontus in Asia Minor, in his famous letter to 
the Emperor Trajan, mentions the Christian custom of meet- 
ing before the light of day, " on a stated day" 51 to engage in 
singing a hymn of praise to Jesus as God, when they all par- 
took of the harmless meal. That this was on the Sabbath is 
obvious from the fact that the Christians met on no other day 
for such purpose. Pliny's reference to the Christian Sabbath 
is confirmed by the following testimonies : 

1. The Council of Nicaea (A. D. 325) was the first (Ecu- 
§ 106. conciiiar men i ca l Council held, and among its very first 
Recognition, decisions declared : 

" Forasmuch as some on the Lord's-day bow the knee in prayer, as 
also on other days of Pentecost, for the sake of uniformity, they shall 
now stand to offer their prayers to God." 52 

*8Matt. xxvi, 26-29; Mark xiv, 22-25; Luke xxii, 14-20; John xiii. Recorrob- 
orated by 1 Cor. v, 7, 8 ; xi, 23-29. « Acts xx, 7 ; 1 Cor. xvi, 2. 60 R e v. i, 10. 

61 "Stato die," Letter to Trajan. 62 Council Nicoza, xx. 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 131 

2. The Emperor Constantine, a few years before (321) pub- 
lished an edict recalling both the heathen and the Christian 
subjects from their industries on the Sabbath- § 107 Constan _ 
day, which he designates as "the venerable day tine ' s Edict, 
of the Sun." By this appellation all recognized his meaning 
the Christian Sabbath. He said : 

" Let all the judges and populations of towns, and the duties of all 
professions be discontinued on the venerable day of the Sun." M 

3. Eusebius, the historian (315), says: 

"The Churches throughout the rest of the world who observe the 
practice that has prevailed from apostolic tradition until the present 
time; so that it would not be proper to terminate our 
fast on any other day but the day of the resurrection of ■ Decree* 1 " 
our Savior. Hence there were Synods and Convocations 
of the Bishops on this question, and all unanimously drew up an ecclesias- 
tical decree which they communicated to all the Churches in all places, 
that the mystery of the Lord's resurrection should be celebrated on no other 
than the Lord's-day." 54 

4. Peter, Bishop of Alexandria (300), about fifteen years 
earlier wrote: "We keep the Zord's-day as a day « 10a Bishop 
of joy, because of Him who rose thereon." 55 Peter. 

5. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage (253), eminent for his 
legal lore, about forty-seven years earlier, in a ~ 110 Bi8hov> 
Synodical Letter mentions the well-known fact Cyprian, 
that the Lord^ "s-day was both "the first and the eighth day"™ 

6. Tertullian of Carthage (200), the eminent juris-consult 
in Roman law, said, more than a half-century before Cyprian : 

"It is a well-known fact that we pray towards the §111. Tertul- 
east . . . because we make Sun-day a day of fes- han'sTesti- 
tivity." 67 "In the same way, if we devote Sun-day to 
rejoicing, from a far different reason than Sun-worship, we have some 
resemblance to those of you who devote the day of Saturn to ease and 
luxury. 58 better fidelity of the nations to their own sect, which 
claims no solemnity of the Christians for itself! Not the Lord's-day, 

63 Baxter's Div. AppH of Lord's Day, p. 41. ^Eccl. Hist., B. v, c.23. 

65 Tr]p Kvpia.K7)v x a Pf J - < TVV7 l? Vf J -fy av o.yv€v6fiev. 

66 Dr. Hessey's Bampton Lects.i,ii; or McClintock and Strong's Cyclop, on 
"The Lord's Day!" 67 To the Nations, c. 13. &Apol. 16. 



132 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

not Pentecost, even if they had known them, would they have shared 
with us; for they would fear lest they should seem to be Christians. 
[Though we share with them Sunday], we are not apprehensive lest we 
seem to be heathens." 59 

7. Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons (178), about twenty-two years 
si 12 witness earlier than Tertullian, wrote : "The mystery of 

of irenseus. the Lord's resurrection may not be celebrated on 
any other day than the Lord^s-dayP® 

8. Bardesanes, a learned heretic of Edessa (160), in a 

work entitled, Laws of the Countries, addressed to 

§113. Barde- * ■ 

'sanes' Testi- the Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (reigned 
161-180), about eighteen years earlier than 
Irenaeus, wrote: 

" Wherever we be, all of us are called by the one name of the 
Messiah, [viz.] ' Christians,' and upon one day, which is the first of the week, 
we assemble ourselves together, and on the appointed days we abstain 
from food." 61 

9. Justin Martyr, who is said to have been born in the 
si 14 witness c l° se °^ the nrs ^ century, when John was still 

of Justin. living, wrote (1 35-145) : 

" Sunday is a day on which we all hold our common assembly, because 
it is the first day on which God, having wrought a change in the dark- 
ness and matter, made the world ; and Jesus Christ our Savior, on that 
day rose from the dead. . . . And on the day called Sunday all who 
live in cities or in the country gather together in one place, and the 
memoirs of the apostles, or the writings of the prophets, are read as long 
as time permits.' ' ffl 

10. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, Syria (110), wrote about 
§ii5. witness thirt J 7 ears earlier than Justin: 

of Ignatius. << If> then> thoge who wa ifced in the ancient practices 

attained unto newness of hope, no longer observing Sabbaths, but fash- 
ioning their lives after the Lord's-day, on which our Life also arose 
through Him, . . . that we may be found disciples of Jesus Christ, 
our only Teacher." ^ 

w On Idolatry, c. 14. 

60 Synod. Letter to Bishop Victor of Roine, cited in McClintock and Strong's 
Cyclop.,Y, 507. 

61 See Cureton's transl. in McClintock and Strong's Cyclop., v. 507. 
63 First Apol., c. 67. ^Epis.Mag., c. 9, Bishop Lightfoot's transl. 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 133 

11. Barnabas, one of the "Apostolic Fathers" {not the 
companion of Paul), wrote about A. D. 70-79 : §ne. witness 

"Finally he saith, . . . Your present Sabbaths are of Barnabas, 
not acceptable to me. ... I shall make a [new] beginning of the 
eighth day, that is the beginning of another world. Wherefore also we 
keep the Lord's-day with joyf ulness ; the day also on which Jesus rose 
from the dead." 64 

12. The Apostle John, either A. D. 68 or 96, while re- 
cording his Apocalyptic Visions which he saw §3117 Witnesa 
at Patmos, in his opening chapter says: of John. 

"J, John, who am your brother and companion in tribulation, . . . 
was in the isle which is called Patmos, for the Word of God, and the 
testimony of Jesus Christ. I was in the Spirit on the Lord's-day."* 5 

13. The Didache, or Teaching of the Apostles § 118 Witness 
(70-1 00), written within the Apostolic Age, reads : of the Didacne. 

"On the Lord's own day gather yourselves together, and break 
bread, and give thanks." 66 

14. Paul the Apostle (about A. D. 64) spent seven days at 
Troas, and his companion Luke thus reports the „ 119 Witness 
apostolic rule there enjoined : of Paul. 

" Upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together 
to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the mor- 
row." " Now concerning the collection of the saints, as I have given 
order to the Churches of Galatia, even so do ye. Upon the first day of 
the week let every one of you lay by him in store as God hath prospered 
him, that there be no gathering when I come." 67 

The territory traversed respecting the institution of the 
Christian Sabbath is that period of time embraced between 
the establishment of the Christian religion as the „ 120 The 
religion of the Koman Empire (323-325) and Resume, 
that in which the apostles themselves taught. This yields not 
only the apostolic teachings on this subject, but also the con^ 

<*Epis., c.14 

65 Rev. i, 9, 10. If John was exiled In the reign of Nero, as all the internal 
evidence indicates, the Apocalypse was written about 67; if under Domitian, as 
the external evidence indicates, the writing occurred about 96 The earlier date 
is favored by Neander, Gieseler, Baur, Ewald, Liicke, Bleek, DeWette, Reuss, Diis- 
terdieck, Weiss, Renan, Stanley, Bishop Lightfoot, and Canon Westcott. See also 
Schaff's Hist. Christ. Church, I, 429. « 6 Didache, c. 14. 67 Acts xx, 7; 1 Cor. xvi, 2. 



134 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

stant practice of the Church. The testimonies cited are the 
most authoritative known to early Christian history ; namely, 
of the emperor, Council, bishops, apologists, a heretic, one dis- 
ciple of the apostles, the document entitled Teaching of the 
Apostles, and, finally, the utterances of two of the most dis- 
tinguished apostles themselves. The witnesses are fourteen in 
number; and their witness comes from different centuries, 
from different countries, written in different languages ; but 
each one attests the apostolic teaching and the Christian prac- 
tice of observing the first day of the week as the Christian 
Sabbath. Moreover, they all confirm the statement made by 
Pliny that the Christians were accustomed to meet on "a 
stated day" for their sacred observances. The catena of 
proofs is complete, extending through the first three hundred 
years after the crucifixion of Christ, averaging one witness for 
less than every twenty-five years in consecutive order. Now, 
reckoning the Christian era to have begun B. C. 4, and allow- 
ing thirty-three years until the crucifixion, the observance of 
the Sabbath-day in all Christendom, weekly, has been no less 
than ninety-seven thousand two hundred and seventy-two 
times until our present twentieth century. Such, then, is 
a standing witness through all the centuries, from the very 
beginning, of the constant usage of the Church; and the 
Sabbath-day is itself a monumental evidence of the antiquity 
and the historicity of Christianity. 

The Christianity of Christ. 

Jesus appears to have passed through his earlier years re- 
garded as a peasant related to the mountain tribe of Judah, 
rather than as the Child of roval blood, until his 

§121. Christ J ' 

and entrance upon public life at the age of thirty, 
nstiam y. g^ g ^^ a pp earance j s m company with the Bap- 
tist, while engaged in his initiative rite for his Messianic 
work. His ministry opened and closed within the brief period 
of three years and a half. But, in results, the world knows 
no comparison. His wondrous success, which augments as the 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 135 

world grows older, can never be explained on mere natural 
principles. As to all human resources, Christ's were conspic- 
uous for their poverty. It was clearly a case in which triumph 
of power came under the worst conditions which it was pos- 
sible to impose. He was born in obscurity, nurtured in pov- 
erty, and died in shame. He was without wealth, without in- 
fluence, without friends, without arms or arsenals, without 
navy or nation, to enforce his will. Eather, he proposed the 
immediate aggression and complete conquests in the world 
merely by the power of persuasion and love; and no other 
man born of woman ever so impressed himself upon the con- 
sciousness of mankind. None ever attained his exalted purity 
of character, or acquired such place and pre-eminence in his- 
tory. "Wherever the story of his life is told, it makes a power- 
ful impression, and can never be forgotten. Though now it is 
approaching two thousand years since his crucifixion, he was 
never more alive and within touch of every man's conscience. 
His influence has grown to be a thousand-fold greater than it 
was on the day when he died. Even his enemies are resist- 
lessly stirred at the very thought of Jesus. They can not 
leave him alone. He will not down at their bidding. Men 
who will not pray, at least will blaspheme his name. But his 
power has never for a moment been repressed. His fame has 
been given to the nations. It is now encompassing the globe. 
It has found expression in the great languages of the earth. 
If all the literature relating to his words and deeds, to his life 
and death, were suddenly retired from the libraries of mankind, 
the world would stand amazed at the vacancy which would 
be created. That his power has changed the course of his- 
tory, none can intelligently deny. Kingdoms and nations rise 
and fall, but his name is an everlasting name, which shall not 
be cut off, and his kingdom shall know no end. Millions who 
have learned his fame believe that Jesus was the very Son of 
God ; and many millions more who have lived but are passed 
away, reposed their hope for immortality in the power of that 
name. If Jesus be not the Christ of Scripture, there never 



136 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

was, and there never can be, another. For he fulfilled the 
predictions of Christ, and he did the works of Christ, and he 
suffered the sufferings of Christ; and now he reigns in the 
royalty of Christ. As Jean Paul Kichter has so beautifully 
expressed it : 

" The life of Christ concerns him who, being the holiest of the 
mighty and the mightiest of the holy, lifted with his pierced hand em- 
pires off their hinges, and turned the stream of centuries out of its 
channel, and still governs the Ages." 

It is to be noted that wherever Christianity has gone and 
has been cordially received, it has proved itself a stupendous 
fact and factor in the political world, in the practical affairs 
of society at large, as well as a directive power acting upon 
the character and life of the individual man. In every 
country and community where it has become permanently 
rooted in society or State, it has been recognized as both a 
conservative force in restraining vice, and an aggressive force 
for the upbuilding of moral and spiritual worth in human 
character. Those civilizations on the atlas of the globe which 
to-day have pre-eminence in place and power are the Christian 
nations which stand in the forefront of the universe just in 
proportion as they have stood for the enforcement of the prin- 
ciples and spirit of Christianity. A distinct and absolute line 
can be drawn on the world's map, separating and illustrating 
just where the gospel has gone, and where it is yet to go. It 
can not be ignored that the several Christian nations of 
Europe and America are incomparably superior to those of 
Asia and Africa, in intelligence, in character and happiness 
of the people, in civilization and government, in invention, in 
industry, and the arts, both practical and aesthetic, no less 
than in military and naval prowess. Who are the " Powers 
of Europe" but the most advanced Christian nations of the 
earth? Which are "the Dark" Continents, but those which 
the Christian religion has not yet penetrated and permeated, 
where the effete religions of a barbaric ancestry still hold in 
crudest bondage the minds of a people devoted to their an- 



The Historical Christ and Ancient Christianity. 137 

cient traditions, with all the horrors of their fanatical and 
superstitious practices? 

Confessedly the foremost nations of the earth are those 
which have founded their laws upon the legislation of Moses 
in the wilderness and the Sermon of Christ upon the moun- 
tains. Truly did that great judicial mind, Sir Matthew Hale, 
remark that " Christianity is a parcel of the common law." 
It does not enter the halls of legislation to dictate or make 
codes, but it teaches legislators right principles of equity, and 
molds the conscience to a sense of that which is right and just 
in ruling. In these nations alone has the spirit existed which 
destroyed the infamous slave-trade, which has broken off for- 
ever the shackles of the bondsmen; has elevated the lowly to 
the possibilities and realizations of places of power and prefer- 
ment; has enriched countries with educational institutions for 
the advantage anql advancement of the youth; has created 
homes for the aged, societies for the protection of children, 
founded hospitals for the sick and afflicted, established re- 
formatories for the recovery of the erring and fallen, and 
built churches for the salvation of the unsaved. They have 
organized the people into societies to prevent cruelty to brutes. 
Nay, it is the very spirit and law of the Christian religion to 
teach kindliness in the home, care for the servants, help for 
the poor, respect for children, deference to parents, honor to 
woman, reverence for the aged, love for one's neighbor, to 
bring charities for the destitute, missions to the pagans, and 
Christ everywhere for the unsaved. With such a history be- 
hind it, and such objects for activity before it, and such a 
spirit within it, it is obviously quite too late to attempt 
to relegate Christianity to the rear, or politely bow it out 
of existence, or assign it a place among the common myths 
of superstitious peoples. The impotent sneer of the disbeliever 
is a confession that as a reasoner he has ceased to be rational, 
and feels that he can not refute the just and open claims of 
the religion of Christ. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE PKOOF OF MIRACLES WROUGHT BY 
JESUS CHRIST. 

I. Preliminaries to the Discussion. 

1. General Definition of Miracles. 

2. Miracles Witnessed by the Disciples. 

3. Miracles not denied for Four Centuries. 

II. Attestations op Enemies to Miracles. 
o) The Testimony of Jewish Writers. 

a. The Witness of Josephus. 

b. The Witness of the Talmud. 

c. The Witness of Toledoth Jeshu. 
/S) The Testimony of Roman Writers. 

a. The Witness of Celsus. 

b. The Witness of Porphyry. 

c. The Witness of Hierocles. 

d. The Witness of Julian. 

(a) Heathen Explanations of Miracles. 

(b) Objection to Witnesses Considered. 

III. Confirmatory Attestations to Miracles. 

a. The Testimony of Origen. 

b. The Testimony of Tertullian. 

c. The Testimony of Irenseus. 

d. The Testimony of Quadratus. 

e. The Testimony of an Arabic Writer. 

139 



Chapter VI. 

THE PEOOF OF MIKACLES WKOUGHT BY 
JESUS CHEIST. 

§ 122. Sources : Biographical Epitomes, and Literature. 

1. Hieeocles ('lepoKXijg-, " Literary," wrote about A. D. 303) was an emi- 

nent adversary of Christianity, and being in the Roman Govern- 
ment was first proconsul at Bithynia in Asia Minor; also 
afterwards at Alexandria in Egypt (284-305) . He was a man of 
superior philosophical acquirements, and wrote a work consisting 
of two books to suppress the Christian religion. It was entitled 
A6yoi $i\a\r)dei? irpb? roi>? Xpumapoijr, Truth-loving Words to the Chris- 
tians. He assails the character of Jesus and his apostles, and puts 
our Lord on a level with a certain magician named Apollonius 
of Tyana. He does not dispute any of the books of the New Tes- 
tament as to their authenticity or credibility, but attempts to 
disparage the writers by calling them hard names. In his zeal, 
he testifies to the names of six of the eight different writers of 
these Scriptures. Unfortunately, his writing was destroyed by 
the mistaken judgment of some of the later Christian emperors, 
although, like the work of Porphyry, fragments have been pre- 
served in the citations of other writers. 

2. Quadratus (123-127) has been called "a disciple of the apostles." 

However that may be, he rose to pre-eminence by virtue of his 
genius and great activity in behalf of the Christian faith. He is 
said to have been the first Christian writer who presented a 
Defense (called Apology) of Christianity to a Roman Emperor. 
Eusebius describes Quadratus as " a man of understanding, and 
of apologetic faith," who "brought together again the Christians 
of Athens who had been scattered abroad by persecutions, and to 
have rekindled their faith." (Ecc. Hist. IV, 23.) Some suppose 
that he was that Quadratus who was Bishop of Athens, which is 
quite likely. At least his Defense being presented to the Emperor 
Hadrian (117-138), it was treated with imperial favor. For a time 
the persecutions ceased. Canon Westcott thinks that the famous 
Epistle to Diognetus of Mathetes was written by Quadratus. 
Eusebius says: "Among those who were illustrious at the time 
was Quadratus, who, together with the daughters of Philip, is 

141 



142 Historical Evidence of the ]S"ew Testament. 

said to have enjoyed the gift of prophecy [see Acts xxi, 9]. . . . 
Traveling abroad, they prefer the work of evangelists, being de- 
sirous to preach Christ, and deliver the Scriptures of the Divine 
Gospels:" Kai ttjv t&v dei&v €vayye\ltap irapabibbaai. ypcuprjv. 

3. Rousseau (1712-1778), a notorious disbeliever, was born at Geneva, 

Switzerland, and was the child of neglect. He became first a 
wanderer, and afterwards a Roman Catholic. An erratic adven- 
turer, he went to Paris at the age of thirty. He there won a 
prize essay awarded by the Academy of Dijon, written on the 
proposition, " Has the Revival of Science and Art Helped to 
Corrupt or to Purify Morals ?" He affirmed the former hypoth- 
esis. He then devoted himself to literature. His position was, 
that all men are born equal ; that the possession of property is a 
crime ; that the soil belongs to no man ; that the fruit of the soil 
belongs to every man equally ; that monarchy means tyranny ; 
and that religion is a superstition. David Hume patronized Rous- 
seau for a while ; but they soon came to a public quarrel, and 
Hume in self-vindication published the correspondence between 
them. Rousseau then wrote a handbook called J&mile, which as- 
sailed the French Government. The work was burned and its 
author exiled. Rousseau, however, returned and died near Paris. 
He is represented in history as a man of impure life. But for 
subtle eloquence he had no rival in French literature. He had 
genius without judgment ; but his greatest defect of character was 
the fact that he was destitute of principle. His Confessions 
(Geneva, 4 vols., 1782) have been translated into most of the civil- 
ized languages. 

4. David Hume (1711-1776) was a Scotchman, born at Edinburgh, and an 

historian of England. He developed a passion for literature early. 
At the age of sixteen he became a skeptic. He was a man of pure 
morals and amiable manners. As an historian he was in some re- 
spects very able, but inaccurate and partial. He maintained that 
" the doctrine of an Absolute First Cause is unwarrantable in phi- 
losophy." His famous sophism against miracles was at first pro- 
posed in mere jest to silence a Jesuit named La Fleche, who had 
claimed that a miracle had recently been performed in his convent. 
Afterwards he elaborated this idea against the miracles of the 
Scriptures. The fallacy of Hume's assumption has often since 
been exposed — in the last instance by his admirer and biographer, 
Thomas Huxley. 

5. Thomas H. Huxley, born in England in 1825, graduated with dis- 

tinction from the University of London in 1845, was appointed 
Professor of History in the School of Mines and of Physiology in 1854, 
and professor in the Royal College of Surgeons in 1863-1869, was 
elected president of the Geological and Ethnological Societies 



The Proof of Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ. 143 

during 1869 and 1870. He labored most in the line of Biological 
Science, and distinguished himself most in Comparative Anatomy 
of both vertebrate and invertebrate animals, and succeeded in 
systematizing organisms. He proposed several rearrangements 
into new orders and classes. Among nine different works from 
his pen, are his Lay Sermons and his Huxley's Hume. He was a 
skeptic. His death occurred June 29, 1885. 

6. Daniel Schenkel, born at Dogerlin, Canton Zurich, Switzerland, in 

1813. He studied theology in Bale under the teaching of the 
notable DeWette and Hagenbach, and afterwards at Gottingen. 
He became Professor of Theology in Bale in 1849, and in Heidel- 
berg in 1851. He published his Christliche Dogmatik, in two vol- 
umes, in "Wiesbaden, in 1858 and 1859, and his Das Characterbild 
Jesu in 1864. At Heidelberg he nearly lost his position because of 
his rationalism. 

7. Karl Immanuel Nitzsch, a native of Borna, Saxony, born 1787. He 

pursued theology at Wittenberg, and was elected professor at 
Bonn in 1822, and at Berlin in 1847, where he died in 1868. As a 
theologian, Nitzsch belonged to the orthodox school of Neander 
and Tholuck. He was the author of several valuable works. 

8. Philip Schaff, a native of Switzerland, born in 1819. He studied at 

Coire, Stuttgart, Tubingen, Halle, and Berlin. He was elected 
Professor in the University of Berlin in 1841; and upon the 
recommendation of Neander and Tholuck came to America in 1844, 
to take a theological chair in the German Reform School in Mer- 
cersburg, Pennsylvania. Afterward he was elected Professor of 
Ecclesiastical History in the Union Theological Seminary in the 
city of New York. He was appointed president of the American 
Revision Committee of the Scriptures in 1871, which he is said to 
have regarded as the greatest compliment received in his life, es- 
pecially as he had not acquired a mastery of the English until he 
had attained his manhood. Dr. Schaff was a man of remarkable 
scholarship, who did more for this country in the lines of the- 
ological literature than any man in America. Among his many 
productions may be named his Person of Christ, in reply to Renan 
and Strauss (12th edition, 1882) ; History of the Christian Church 
(6 vols., 2d ed. enlarged and revised); and his editorship of a Re- 
ligious Encyclopedia (3 vols., 1884). 

9. George P. Fisher, born in Massachusetts in 1827. He was graduated 

at Brown University, Rhode Island, in 1847 ; also in the Theological 
School at New Haven, after which he studied in Germany. He was 
elected to the Chair of Theology in 1854, but in 1861 was trans- 
ferred to the Chair of Ecclesiastical History at New Haven. He 
is a writer of several very valuable critical and historical works. 
10 



144 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

In 1865, Dr. Fisher published a work of rare value on the Super- 
natural Origin of Christianity; in 1883 he issued Grounds of The- 
istic and Christian Belief; and subsequently his Beginnings of 
Christianity, and another on Church History. " His writings are 
marked by learning, acuteness, solidity, and breadth of vision." 

§ 123. Miracles of Jesus Christ. 

The denial of miracles involves the denial of a free, living, personal 
God. — Nitzsch. 

Seriously to raise the question would be impious, if it were not absurd. 
— Rousseau. 

Only few men are wise enough to perceive that much more intelligence 
is necessary to the believing of a miracle than cleverness in its 
denial. — Schenkel. 

If miracles are disproved, Christianity is stripped of its essential pe- 
culiarity. The central fact of a supernatural interposition having 
for its end the restoration of man to communion with God is lost. 
— Fisher. 

Christianity does, indeed, involve many difficulties, but it does not 
create them. The essence of Christianity lies in a miracle. — 
Westcott. 

Christ must be reckoned to be a magician, because he did many wonder- 
ful things. — Hierocles. 

The contemporaries of Jesus, his enemies as well as his friends, believed 
in his power of miracles, with this difference: that one traced it 
to Satan, the other to God. — Schaff. 

ARGUMENT. 

During the ministry of Jesus Christ, his contemporaries had ample 
opportunities to witness the signs of his Messiahship in his many 
miracles. Multitudes realized, in their own experience or in 
their observation, the proof of his miraculous power, in the cure 
of the blind, in the recovery of the leper, in the casting out of 
demoniacs, in multiplying loaves for the living, in raising the 
dead to life. Though his enemies ignored his claims so far justi- 
fied as the Messiah of prophecy, they did not deny that he certainly 
exercised supernatural power over nature, disease, and death, 
which, however, they chose to ascribe to the agency of Satan. It 
is a remarkable circumstance that for several centuries after our 
Lord's death, neither Jew nor heathen adversary attempted to 
deny the fact that Jesus did work miracles. Upon the contrary, 
they admitted it to be the truth that he wrought miraculous 
occurrences which they sought to explain by referring them to 
magic, to sorcery, or to juggling: — matters which were more 
familiar to the heathen mind. 






The Proof of Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ. 145 

Now, the admission of enemies on matters of fact is strictly evidential ; 
but their mere opinions or interpretation of facts are not, for the 
reason that opinions may be only prejudices, and interpretations 
may be mere perversions ; so that both are inadmissible in the 
courts, as a rule. As important concessions of facts were em- 
bodied in the literary works of enemies written expressly to 
destroy the Christian religion with the people anciently, these 
will here be reproduced to verify and attest the authenticity and 
historicity of Christ's miracles as recorded in the four Gospels. 
The testimony of the adversaries having been adduced to prove 
the fact of miracles, confirmation of their testimony by early 
Christians will be added, further to substantiate their historical 
occurrence. 

1. Preliminaries respecting the miracles of Christ. 

2. Witness of the enemies of the Christian religion. 

3. Confirmation by the friends of Christianity. 

Preliminaries to the Discussion. 

a) By the word miracle is meant a fact or event made 
manifest to the human senses, wrought by the direct will and 
power of God, in the interests of Divine re vela- _ 

r -> §124. Defini- 

tion. By its nature it belongs to the system of tion of 

redemption, and can not be properly considered 
as a part of Christian evidence when sundered from its right- 
ful place and relations. John Stuart Mill, himself an Atheist, 
wrote : 

"It is evidently impossible to maintain that if a supernatural fact 
really occurs, proof of its occurrence can not be accessible to human 
faculties. The evidence of the senses could prove this, as it can prove 
other things." 1 

Dr. Charles Hodge also remarks : 

" The raising of Lazarus from the dead may be taken as an example. 
This was an event which occurred in the outer world ; one which could 
be seen and verified by the testimony of the senses. It was not brought 
about either in whole or in part by the efficiency of natural causes. It 
was due to a simple word or volition or immediate agency of God. . . . 
So when Christ walked the sea, when he multiplied the loaves and 
fishes, when he calmed the winds and waves by a command, — any 
co-operation of physical causes is not only ignored, but, by clearest inti- 
mation, denied." 2 



l Three Essays on Theism, 217. ^Systematic Theol. I, 618. 



146 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

/?) Neither does a miraculous occurrence mean a suspen- 
sion, contravention, or violation of natural forces/ nor is it to 
be explained on natural principles or it would not be a miracle, 
since it arises outside of operations found in the system of 
nature. That is, though the natural forces remain uninter- 
rupted in the exercise of their function, a different effect is 
produced by reason of a different and Divine Cause. When 
Israel invaded Canaan, the upper waters of the Jordan were 
stayed, and the lower waters flowed away. Now, nature's 
forces were never more powerfully active to cause the waters 
to flow as usual, but Avhile the forces remained intact, the 
usual effect did not result, but was changed by the interposi- 
tion of the Divine Cause. Cause and effect are to be discrim- 
inated. The effect of the force is not identical with the force 
itself, any more than the sound of an explosion is identical 
with the force which explodes. 

Mr. David Hume, the famous disbeliever, catching the hint 
from Spinoza, followed his lead, and insisted that miracles 
were a violation of natural laws, and therefore incredible. 
He said : 

" Miracles are violations of the laws of nature. But we learn from 
experience that the laws of nature are never violated. " "For miracles 
we have the questionable testimony of a few persons ; . . . against 
them we have universal experience; therefore this stronger testimony 
nullifies the weaker and more questionable. " " It is a miracle that a 
dead man should come to life, because that has never been observed in 
any age or country." 

Thomas H. Huxley, the admirer and biographer of Hume, 
himself also a skeptic, thus exposes the sophistry and fallacies 
of these propositions : 

11 The definition of a miracle as a suspension or a contravention of 
the order of nature is derived from our observation of the course of 
events of which the so-called miracle is a part. On the other hand, no 
conceivable event, however extraordinary, is impossible ; and therefore, 
if by the term miracles we mean only extremely wonderful events, there 
can be no just ground for denying the possibility of their occurrence." 
"That is to say, there is a uniform experience against such an event, 



The Proof of Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ. 147 

and therefore, if it occurs, it is a violation of the laws of nature. Or, to 
put the argument in its naked absurdity, that which never happened, never 
can happen without a violation of the laws of nature." 3 

Obviously it can not be claimed that a miracle is contrary 
to human experience, since all miracles constitute a part of 
that "universal experience" just the same as all other events. 

Nor can the claim be justified that the disciples' testimony 
respecting miracles is inadmissible, as they do §125. The Dis- 
not say themselves that they ever witnessed his SSaedHta 
miraculous works. The fact in the case is quite Miracles. 
to the contrary. This is made sufficiently clear in the 
Scriptures. 

a) John attests : 

" There was a marriage in Cana of Galilee. . . . And both Jesus 
was called and his disciples to the marriage." Then follows the account 
of Christ converting the water into wine. "This beginning of miracles 
did Jesus in Oana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory; and his dis- 
ciples believed on him." 4 "And many other signs did Jesus in the presence 
of his disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written that 
ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God." 5 His miracles 
were not wrought in concealment, but openly before the public ; for "A 
great multitude followed him because they saw the miracles which he 
did on them that were diseased;" 6 and "Many believed on him when 
they saw the miracles which he did." 7 But it is related in another 
instance that " Though he had done so many miracles before them, yet 
they believed not on him." 8 

(3) Peter also witnesses : 

"How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and 
with power, who went about doing good, and healing all that were 
oppressed of the devil ; for God was with him ; and we are witnesses of all 
things which he did both in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem." 2 

y) Jesus himself declares : 

"And ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with me from 
the beginning." 10 To some of the multitude whom he had fed, he said, 
" Ye seek me not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of 
the loaves and were filled." u 

^Huxley's Hume, 158, 156. * John ii, 1, 2, 11. 6 John xx, 30, 31. «Z&. vi, 2. 
7J6.ii, 23. 8J6. xii, 37. «Acts x, 38, 39. w John xv, 27. "John vl, 26. 



148 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Now, it is a truth to be specially noted for its evidential 

value, that no enemy of Christianity for the first four hundred 

~„ ,,. , years denied or made Question of the fact that 

§126. Miracles u * . 

stood Christ wrought miracles among the people. This 
is true both of his contemporaries and their 
successors, whether Jew or heathen. This claim was assailed 
neither by Josephus nor Tacitus of the first century, nor 
by Celsus or Lucian of the second century, nor by Aurelian 
or Porphyry of the third century, nor by Hierocles or Julian 
of the fourth century, nor yet by the Jewish Talmud, 
whose writing was not concluded until the third Christian 
century. Upon the contrary, wherever they refer to Christ's 
miraculous works, they concede the fact without qualification, 
and in some cases they even mention the kind of miracle that 
was wrought. It certainly would have been of great advan- 
tage to those whose hostility led them to write for the very 
purpose of destroying Christianity, to have truthfully denied 
that which was made a standing challenge by both Christian 
apostles and apologists of the faith. How could this have 
been the case unless Christ's miraculous works were undeniably 
valid and historical? For adverse writers represented not 
only themselves, but also the Jewish or heathen populations 
behind them. They all realized and confessed that something 
had occurred which they hoped to explain. They therefore 
offered their opinions in explanation, that these miracles were 
works of magic, or jugglery, or of sorcery, or were attributable 
to the devil ; conclusions not based upon investigation, but in 
accordance with their prejudices, and on a line with those 
deceptive arts with which they were most familiar. The 
Jewish adversaries, who were his contemporaries, and their 
successors, while they could not deny the fact of miraculous 
occurrences, were yet unwilling to allow that these were the 
signs of his Messiahship, and avoided and evaded that claim 
by imputing miracles to Satan. The record reads : 

"The multitudes marveled, saying, It was never so seen in Israel; 
but the Pharisees said, By the prince of demons he casteth out demons." 



The Proof of Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ. 149 

"And he called them unto him, and he said unto them, . . . How- 
can Satan cast out Satan ? And if Satan also is divided against himself, 
how can his kingdom stand ; because ye say that I cast out demons by 
Beelzebub, the prince of demons." 12 

Dr. Philip Schaff has aptly remarked : 

" The contemporaries of Jesus, his enemies as well as his friends, 
believed in his power of miracles, with this difference, that the one 
traced it to Satan, the other to God. Is it credible that John the Bap- 
tist, of whom no miracles are recorded, the twelve apostles, the seventy 
disciples, the learned and clear-headed Paul, the Evangelists, Mcodemus 
[of the Jewish Sanhedrin], the hostile Pharisees and Sadducees, the 
Sanhedrin [itself], and the common people in Jerusalem and the villages 
of Galilee, who witnessed his mighty works, should all have been radi- 
cally mistaken? . . . To reject [miracles] imposes upon us the 
incredible belief that a whole generation of friends and foes were radi- 
cally mistaken in a matter of common experience." 13 

Enemies' "Witness to Miracles. 

1. Josephus (b. 37), the famous historian of §127. Jewish 

the ancient Jews, bears witness unto Jesus to Testimonies - 

this effect : 

" Now, there was about this time Jesus a wise man, if it be lawful 
to call him a man ; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such 
men as receive the truth with pleasure." 14 

2. The Talmud. Both the Babylonian and the Palestinean 
Gemara in the unexpurgated editions of Amsterdam in or prior 
to 1645, contain brief but very malicious references to Jesus 
Christ and the apostles. The G-emara represents our Lord as 
the illegitimate son of Mary, a hairdresser, and a man called 
Stadia; that at one time Jesus visited Egypt, and there learned 
the arts of the magicians, which he afterwards practiced in 
Palestine, and that on this account as well as for leading 
Israel astray, the Jewish rulers caused him to be crucified. Re- 
specting testimony of the Talmud, Dr. Philip Schaff remarks : 

"We have here evidently a malignant perversion and indirect ad- 
mission of the facts of the supernatural conception, the flight to Egypt, 
the miracles [of Jesus], and the crucifixion of our Savior." 16 



12 Matt, ix, 34; comp. Mark iii, 22, 23, 26; Luke xi, 15, 18-20. 

^Person of Christ, 97-99. ™Ant. xviii, 3, 3. See also Appendix A. 

is Person of Christ, 195. 



150 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

The Talmud reads : 

"The Gemara contains this: A Tradition. R. [i. e., Rabbi] Eliezer 
said to the wise men, 'But did not the Son of Stadia bring magical arts 
out of Egypt, in the cutting of his flesh ?' The gloss says, ' The reason 
for that [i. e., the cutting of his flesh] was that he could not bring them 
away [in any other manner], that he might not carry out magical arts 
to teach them to men dwelling in other countries!" 16 

3. Toledoth Jeshu, a very ancient rabbinical work, admits 
the fact that Jesus wrought miracles which it calls magic, 
and that he was well skilled in these arts. But it curiously 
ascribes his power to do such mighty works to the Incom- 
municable Name "Jehovah," which, it states, was clan- 
destinely obtained by him out of the temple ; a name called 
by the Jews "shem Hamphorash ;" * a word placed there by 
Solomon, which had been guarded there for a thousand years by 
two lions ! The work further admits that — 

" Jesus walked upon the sea, cured a leper, and raised the dead. It 
even goes so far as to describe that on one occasion the dry bones of a 
dead body were brought to Jesus out of a sepulcher, and he united 
bone to bone, clothed the whole with sinews, flesh, and skin, and the 
dead body stood upon its feet and lived again ! " ir 

These admissions that Jesus did work miracles, found in 
Jewish literature, are mixed with such manifest perversions of 
fact and such puerilities of superstition as to seem almost in- 
credible. Upon the other hand, there is no denial, but rather 
a positive assertion of the occurrence of miracles recorded by 
these adversaries, who even designate the kind of miracle 
which Jesus wrought. Now, if the mere tricks of the magician 
can actually cause a man to walk upon the sea amidst a tem- 
pest, can cleanse the leper, can raise the dead, then truly 
"magic" is but another name for miracle. "A rose is just as 
sweet by any other name." But when did "magic" ever per- 
form such wonders? 

* Derived from D$, name, and #"130 the Pual participle of t£h£) to be de- 
clared. That is, the incommunicable name HUT {Jehovah), which no orthodox 
Jew will pronounce correctly, ever remains to be declared [and is] incommunicable. 

™Babyl. Tal., Sanhedr. fol. 107, 6; Schabbath fol. 104, 2; Soto fol. 47, 1; also 
Palest. Tal., Schabbath fol. 13, 1; Misch. Schabbath fol. 4, 2. 

m Rabbi Frey, Joseph and Benj. I, 214. 



The Proof of Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ. 151 

To these testimonies of the ancient Jews may be super- 
added that of the modern Dr. Graetz, himself a Jew and the 
distinguished historian of the Jews. He says : 

"The Christian chronicles abound in extraordinary events and de- 
scriptions of miraculous cures by Jesus. Though these stories may in 
part be due to an inclination to exaggerate and idealize, they must 
doubtless have had some foundation in fact. Miraculous cures — such, for 
example, as the exorcism of those possessed of demons — belonged so com- 
pletely to the personality of Jesus that his followers boasted more of the 
exercise of that power than of the purity and holiness of their [own] 
conduct. " 18 

This frank concession of the historical fact that Jesus 
actually wrought miracles would be very admirable in the 
Jewish historian if it were not marred by a gratuitous reflec- 
tion upon his followers, which evades the force of the fact ad- 
mitted. For is it not quite obvious that if his 

^ , §128. Philos- 

disciples had "hoasted" at all "of the purity and ophers' 

holiness of their [own] conduct," it would have es imony * 

evidenced that they possessed neither? But the "conduct" 

of Christ's disciples is altogether an admission that Jesus did 

actually work miracles. 

4. Celsus (wrote 150): 

"Jesus . . . having hired himself out as a servant in Egypt on 
account of his poverty, and having there acquired some miraculous powers, 
on which the Egyptians greatly prided themselves, returned to his own 
country highly elated on account of them, and by means of these he 
proclaimed himself a God." But " these tenets of his were those of a 
God-hated sorcerer." 19 Christians also " deemed Jesus to be the Son 
of God because he healed the lame and the blind. ,} "Moreover, as you 
[Christians] assert, he raised the dead." 20 Origen, replying, says: 
" Celsus . . . affects to grant that those statements may be true 
which are made regarding his cures, or his resurrection, or the feeding 
of a multitude with a few loaves, from which many fragments remained 
over," and then he quotes Celsus as saying, "Well, let us believe that 
these were actually wrought by you." 21 " O light and truth! Jesus 
with his own voice expressly declares . . . that there will appear 
among you others also who will perform miracles of similar kind, 
but who are wicked men and sorcerers." 22 



ls Hist. of the Jews, I, 156, 157. 19 Origen contra Celsum, I, 28, 71. 

a°i&. II, 48. 21/^.1,68. 

22 Origen contra Celsum, II, 49, 53; comp. Matt, xxlv, 24; Markxiii, 22; 2 Thess. 
ii, 9, 10. 



152 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

An analysis of Celsus's testimony yields the following con- 
cessions of fact : 

1. He admits that Jesus actually did "acquire miraculous 

powers" in Egypt, though Christ then was but a babe! 

2. Specifically he effected "cures," "fed the multitude with a 

few loaves," "healed the lame and the blind," and "raised 
the dead." 

3. Nevertheless, these wonders of Jesus, so far from being 

miraculous, were the acts of no other than " a God-hating 
sorcerer." 

4. That Jesus confessed that "wicked men and sorcerers" 

would arise and "perform miracles of similar kind" to 

his own. 
Evidently these several propositions are incompatible with 
each other. For miracles can not at the same time be both 
true and false, actual and yet deceptive, causing "cures" of 
" the lame and blind," feeding " thousands with a few loaves," 
and yet be "the tenets of a G-od-hating sorcerer." Such, then, 
is the best and the worst that Celsus has to say of our Lord 
and his miracles. He obviously criticises these Christian 
tenets in an unscientific spirit, but in accordance with his 
own heathen prepossessions. Nevertheless, he does not, so far, 
evince that vicious disposition which was manifested by the 
Jews from whom Celsus is said to have derived much of his 
information respecting the early Christians. However, being 
a pagan and knowing nothing of miracles, he could not be ex- 
pected to be prepared to believe them to be possible, much 
less to understand their purpose and place in the redemptive 
scheme of the Christian religion. It was quite natural, there- 
fore, that he should identify miraculous occurrences with the 
tricks of impostors — jugglers, magicians, or sorcerers; arts 
which he knew the most about, though he wrote most about 
that of which he knew the least. 

However, in this day these explanations of Celsus do not 
explain. No man of ordinary intelligence would willingly put 



The Proof of Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ. 153 

his reputation to the rack by the offer of a proposition against 
miracles as explained by the mere tricks of the magician. 
For is it not self-evident to an} r but the most superficial 
thinker that, if Jesus actually did walk upon the sea, cleanse 
the leprous, give sight to the blind, and raise the dead, these 
occurrences were in fact miracles, and so at a remove from 
the power and possibility of the impostor? Did a magician 
ever give sight to the blind, or raise the dead, or do anything 
whatever for the permanent good of men ? If the miracles of 
Jesus were countless in number, and wonderful for variety, 
they were wrought in accordance with the more ancient pre- 
diction as the expected * signs" of his Messiahship. They 
were open to the scrutiny of the public, and witnessed by 
multitudes of people ; they were attested under the investiga- 
tion of the Sanhedrists; they were recorded by the Evan- 
gelists in the four Gospels without the slightest fear of contra- 
diction, in the face of their worst foes — a constant challenge 
for all enemies to refute the high claim. With all this sanc- 
tion and authority of Christian antiquity, the Church from 
the very beginning has affirmed that Christ's miracles were 
historical ; and no enemy for four centuries either attempted 
to deny or refute the proposition. 

But the citation from Christ made by Celsus that "wicked 
men and sorcerers" would arise, is an unfair representation of 
Christ's words. What Jesus said was that "there will arise 
false Christs and false prophets, and they will show signs and 
wonders [not 'miracles of similar kind,' as Celsus affirms], 
and they will lead astray, if possible, even the elect." Now, 
the difficulty involved in the representation of Celsus is not 
etymological, hut psychological. It is not to be found in the 
meanings of the words "signs and wonders," but in the 
failure to make the intended application of the words. " For 
'signs and wonders' may alike be properly applied to deeds 
whether good or evil. It is the usus which determines the 
application. We must take the writer's standpoint, think his 



154 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

thoughts as he thought them, and take the same sense which 
he intended. Usually the context settles the meaning of an 
author. So in this Scripture. Jesus said in the good sense : 
"Except ye see signs and wonders ye will not believe." 23 At 
another time, using the same words in a bad sense, he says : 
" There will arise false Christs and false prophets, and will 
show [not the same, but] great signs and wonders, insomuch 
that, if it were possible, they would deceive the very elect." * 
They are the same words truly, but not the same "signs and 
wonders , ." 25 The "signs and wonders" of the false Christ 
expressly "deceive the very elect;" the "signs and wonders" 
of the true Christ confirm and establish the truth. Deceitful 
signs never disprove the true signs which are miraculous, any 
more than the counterfeit disproves the genuineness of the 
true bank's issue. Jannes and Jambres, who withstood Moses 
before Pharaoh, imitated the miracles of Moses and Aaron, but 
finally confessed their failure, acknowledging that those of 
Moses and Aaron were wrought "by the finger of God."™ Paul 
also differences the signs which were true from those that 
were false when he refers to " the working of Satan with all 
power and signs and lying wonders." * 

5. Porphyry (270), as reported by Colonia, 

" Acknowledges that Jesus Christ is a man illustrious for piety, and 
that he is more powerful than iEsculapius and all the other [Greek] 
gods." 27 

JEsculapius, in Greek mythology, was the god of the heal- 
ing art. Hamann forcefully remarks, "Miracles can not be 
believed without a miracle." Probably they are inconceivable 
a priori. At least this testimony of Porphyry, while conced- 

* An instance In point is the case of the famous, or infamous, Bar-Kokheba, 
"the son of a star," who succeeded in raising rebellion of the Jews against the 
Romans in A. D. 135, in the reign of Hadrian. "According to Jerome, this im- 
postor pretended to vomit flames by means of a piece of lighted tow which he 
kept in his mouth I" After his capture and death, his followers called him Bar- 
Kozeba, "the son of a lie." 

23 S^e?a ko.1 ripara, John iv., 48. »* Matt, xxiv, 24; Mark xiii, 22. 

^'ZfTjfieTa fxeydXa ko.1 r^para, Matt, xxiv, 24. 

» Comp. Ex. viii, 18, 19, and 2 Tim. iii, 8. * 7 Cited by Lard, vii, 445. 



The Proof of Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ. 155 

ing so much from his standpoint, illustrates how difficult it is 
for an intelligent and honest heathen, as compared with an 
intelligent Jew, to understand and appreciate the value of a 
miracle, unless a miracle were wrought directly before his 
own eyes. He has never for a moment been in the sphere of 
the miraculous. He has no conception of a power above or 
apart from nature except the arts of the magician. 

6. Hierocles (303) was one of the worst enemies that 
Christianity ever had to encounter. He was the instigator 
and director of the fearful persecution which raged in the 
reign of Diocletian and Maximian (303-306), when Christian 
churches were razed, the Scriptures burned in public, the 
Christians deposed from office, deprived of their civil rights, 
and compelled to sacrifice to false gods under penalty of 
death. Hierocles, so far from denying that Christ wrought 
miracles, admits the fact fully, but seeks to depreciate and 
disparage their evidential value by comparing them with 
fictitious tricks related of one Apollonius. He says : 

"They are continually crying up Jesus for opening the eyes of the 
blind, and other like works. . . . But in the time of our ancestors, 
in the reign of Nero, nourished Apollonius of Tyana, who having, 
when very young, sacrificed at JSgis in Oilicia to that good god ^Escula- 
pius, wrought many and wonderful works. . . . We do not esteem 
him who did these things as a god, but a man favored by the gods ; 
whereas they [the Christians] for the sake of a few tricks called Jesus 
God. . . . Christ, it seems, must be reckoned a magician, because he 
did many wonderful things." K 

7. Julian (361) also bears an important, though unwilling, 
testimony to the miracles of Jesus. He admits that — 

He "rebuked the winds, and walked on the sea, and cast out 
demons, and, as you will have it, made the heavens and the earth — 
though none of his disciples presumed to say this of him except John 
only, nor he clearly and distinctly. However, let it be allowed that he 
said so." " But Jesus . . . having done nothing in his lifetime 
worthy of remembrance — unless one thinks it a mighty matter to heal the 
lame and blind people, and exorcise demoniacs in the villages of Bethsaida 
and Bethany." 29 

w Cited by Lard, vii, 478, 479, 476. » lb. vii, 627. 



156 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



ANALYSIS AND SUMMARY. 

An analysis of the testimonies of these Roman magnates is 
now in place. Hierocles concedes at least that " Christ must be 
reckoned a magician because he did many wonder- 
Roman f ul things ;" and Porphyry confesses that he was 

es im m . u more p 0Wer f u } |h an iEsculapius and all the other 
gods " in these deeds ; while Celsus frankly acknowledges that 
Jesus truly possessed " miraculous powers." The following per- 
sons designate the hind and variety of miracles wrought by 
Christ. Celsus affirms that Jesus "feeding the multitude 
with a few loaves," did "heal the lame and the blind," and 
"raised the dead," who also "made the heavens and the earth;" 
Hierocles, that he "opened the eyes of the blind, and other 
like works;" Julian, that he "rebuked the winds, and walked 
the sea, healed the lame and blind people, and exorcised 
demoniacs in the villages of Bethsaida and Bethany." These 
writers speak not only for themselves, but also for the great 
and intelligent populations behind them. 

The consensus of these ancient adversaries is to the effect 
that, as a fact, Jesus Christ actually wrought miracles. But 
s 130 Heathen they ^ e ^ tna ^ they must explain the fact ; and 
Explanations, their explanations of the power by which these 
effects were produced, differ. But miracles in their very 
nature are inexplicable. The fact conceded is one thing, and 
an adversary's conception of the fact is another. Besides, 
opinions are inadmissible as matters of evidences. To desig- 
nate miracles as "few tricks," as Hierocles has done to mini- 
mize their force or character, does not make them tricks. To 
represent Jesus as "a God-hated Sorcerer" as Celsus does, is 
merely the heathen manner of explaining by calling names. 
Assertion is not proof. "We are dealing now exclusively with 
the conceded fact as historical, that the Founder of Chris- 
tianity wrought astonishing "signs and wonders" in vindica- 
tion of his claim as the predicted Messiah and Redeemer of 



The Proof of Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ. 157 

the world. Jesus himself said : " Believe me that I am in the 
Father, and the Father in me ; or else believe me for the very 
works 7 sake" 20 

It may be objected that these concessions were not made 
by contemporaries who were eye-witnesses of the miraculous 
events conceded. The reply is that, for the veri- o ,„, _ 

r J ' §131. Objec- 

fication of history, it is not necessary that the his- tion con- 
torian himself should have witnessed the facts 
which he records in order to render them historical. But at 
the very beginning, on the birthday of the Christian Church, 
the apostle Peter vindicated the claim by his appeal to those 
who were contemporaries and witnesses of the events alleged, 
when he said to the gathered thousands at Jerusalem : 

"Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God unto you, by mighty 
works and wonders and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you, 
even as ye yourselves know, . . . whereof we all are witnesses." 31 

Such was but the beginning of the proof respecting the 
historicity of the miracles of Christ, and the continuance of 
the evidence by the testimony of enemies in the centuries 
succeeding is but a part of the history of the case ; for it is 
to be remembered that miraculous occurrences were by no 
means limited to Christ's life. The apostles and their suc- 
cessors, in Christ's name and power, continued to work miracles 
for several centuries afterwards, until the Christian religion had 
demonstrated its own supernatural character; then the func- 
tion of miracles had ceased, and they were retired from the 
world. Those ancient adversaries were the contemporaries of 
those miraculous events, and must be allowed to have testified 
advisedly in what they affirm; for how otherwise is it to be 
accounted for that those so hostile to Christianity came to 
have the conviction, and to make those concessions, were 
there no historical grounds for their belief? The conviction 
was there; and it is for him who rejects this explanation to 
furnish a better. How did the belief originate? And is it 

so John xiv, 11 ; comp. v, 86; x, 37, 38; xv, 24. si Acts ii, 22, 32. See also pp. 147, 148. 



158 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

reasonable to suppose that these several adversaries arrived 
at the same conclusion respecting miraculous occurrences with- 
out any basis in actual facts? What but the facts gave rise 
to these heathen conceptions? It must be allowed that there 
was no felt necessity among them, except that imposed by 
history. They testify as independent witnesses, from different 
countries, in different centuries, in substantial agreement, in 
one conclusion. They affirm that Jesus rebuked the winds, 
walked the sea, fed the multitude, opened blind eyes, cleansed 
the leper, cast out demons, and even raised the dead to life. 
For what reason should such testimony from such sources go 
for nothing? What is the justifying ground for rejecting 
this testimony, except for the one reason that these adver- 
saries of Christianity affirm occurrences which are recorded 
in the contents of the several Gospels? Much more dis- 
cernment and character were requisite for such witnesses to 
yield credence to Christian miracles than are required now, 
at this distance of time, to deny their occurrence. The ques- 
tion of miracles is a matter of history, and should be treated 
in an historical spirit. 

§ 132. Friends Confirm the Enemies' Testimony. 

8. Origen (247): " The name of Jesus can still remove distractions 
from the minds of men, expel demons, and also take away diseases, and 
produce a marvelous meekness of spirit and complete change of char- 
acter." 32 

9. Tertullian (200): "As then under the force of their [Judaisticl 
prejudgment they convinced themselves from his lowly guise that 
Christ was no more than a man, as a necessary consequence it followed 
from that, they should hold him [to be] a magician, from the powers 
which he displayed ; expelling devils from men by word, restoring 
sight to the blind, cleansing the leprous, reinvigorating the paralytic, 
summoning the dead to life again, making the very elements of nature 
obey him, stilling the storms, and walking on the sea; proving that he 
was the Logos of God." 33 

10. Irenseus (177): " It is not possible to name the number of gifts 
which the Church throughout the whole world has received from God 



** Contr. Cels. B. 1, c. lxvii. **Apol. c. xxi. 



The Proof of Miracles Wrought by Jesus Christ. 159 

in the name of Jesus Christ, . . . which she exerts day by day for 
the benefit of the Gentiles, neither practicing deception upon any, nor 
taking any reward from them. . . . Calling upon the name of the 
Lord Jesus Christ, she has been accustomed to work miracles for the 
advantage of mankind. ... If therefore, the name of the Lord 
Jesus Christ even now confers benefits, and cures thoroughly and effect- 
ively all who anywhere believe on him . . . it is manifest that 
. . . [he] did all things truly through the power of God." 3 * 

11. Quadratus (125) : "Our Savior's works were always present: for 
they were real, consisting of those who had been healed of their dis- 
eases, those who have been raised from the dead, who were seen not 
only while they were being healed and raised up, but were afterwards 
constantly present [with the living]. Nor did they remain only during 
the sojourn of the Savior on earth, but also a considerable time after 
his departure ; indeed some of them have survived even down to our 
own time." 35 

12. Arabic Writer (name and place unknown) : "We know that the 
people called Christians founded their religion on parables and mir- 
acles." 36 

The important features of this testimony should now be 
carefully noted. Origen, in the middle of the third century, 
testifies that Christ's power "still removed dis- ~ 133 Sum _ 
tractions of mind, cured diseases, expelled de- mary. 
mons, and revolutionized character." Fifty years earlier, Ter- 
tullian testifies that Christ "expelled demons from men, 
restored sight to the blind, cleansed lepers, reinvigorated the 
paralytic, making the very elements of nature obey him." A 
quarter of a century still earlier, Irenaeus relates how that 
"the Church throughout the world" received power from 
God "to work miracles for the advantage of mankind." 
About fifty years yet earlier, in the first quarter of the second 
century, Quadratus mentions that persons then survived who 
illustrated "our Savior's works," men "who had been healed 
of their diseases," and "those who had been raised from the 
dead." And, finally, an unknown Arabic writer affirms that 
"the people called Christians founded their religion on par- 
ables and miracles." 



™Adv. Heresies, B. ii, c. 32, 4, 5. &Euseb. E. H. iv, 

36 MS. of Galen in Smith and Wace's Diet. 

11 



160 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

These testimonies do more than confirm the adversaries' 
witness to miracles. They invariably ascribe the contiwur- 
ance of this imperishable power to Christ's own personality, as 
they were miracles wrought in his name. He endued his fol- 
lowers to do mightier works than those which he himself had 
done. 37 To realize the full force of these several attestations 
of friends and foes, their testimonies must not be taken sep- 
arately, but together in combination, as the cable of power 
results from the union of the several strands composing it, 
which grapples the ship to shore. 



87Johnxlv,12. 



CHAPTER VII. 

CHARACTERISTICS AOT) VALUE OF CHRIST'S 
MIRACLES. 

I. Miracles as Discriminated from Jugglery. 
II. Place of Miracles in the Redemptive Scheme. 

III. Miracles as Christo-centric in Character. 

IV. Relation of Miracles to Epochs and Progress. 
V. Evidential Value of Christ's Miracles. 

161 



Chapter VII. 

CHAEACTEKISTICS AJSTD YALUE OF CHRIST'S 
MIRACLES. 

§ 134. Sources : Biographical Epitomes, and Literature. 

1. John Chrysostom (347-407), the celebrated " golden-mouthed " ora- 

tor of the ancient Church, was a native of Antioch, Syria. He 
studied rhetoric in the school of the famous Sophist, Libanius, 
who deemed Chrysostom to be his best scholar, and desired him 
to become his own successor as Professor of Rhetoric and Elo- 
quence. Afterward he studied philosophy and law. Abandoning 
these, he finally became a devout minister of Jesus Christ, and 
acquired the fame of being the most eloquent preacher in the an- 
cient Church. In A. D. 398 he was appointed Patriarch of Con- 
stantinople, and had St. Sophia for his church. Living most ab- 
stemiously himself, he gave away his income to help the sick and 
poor about him, and was greatly revered. His purity of life, 
added to his remarkable exegetical abilities, gave him a thor- 
oughly practical trend in his teachings. His courage to reform 
extended to the imperial court, whose vices he criticised publicly 
because publicly practiced. In consequence, he was banished by 
the Empress Eudoxia in the year 407. He died aged sixty. His 
best works are his sermons on Genesis, the Psalms, and Homilies 
on most of the New Testament. His published writings number 
thirteen volumes. 

2. John G. Hamann (1730-1788) was a native of Prussia. He studied 

philosophy, philology, theology, and law. Somewhat eccentric, he 
designated himself "The Northern Magian," a title by which he 
is yet known. He found strong friends in such men as F. E. Ja- 
cobi, Berden, and Goethe. His miscellaneous writings were pub- 
lished in Berlin in 1821-1843, in eight volumes, which have attracted 
attention, especially since his death in Germany. 

3. Richard Rothe (1799-1867) was a theological student at Heidelberg. 

" He became successively a member, professor, director, ephorus 
[superintendent] of the Theological Seminary at Wittenberg." 
This was in 1828. In 1837 he was appointed professor of the Uni- 

163 



164 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

versity of Heidelberg, in 1849 in Bonn, and again at Heidelberg in 
1854. He was prominent as a dogmatic and historical writer. 
Since his death his lectures have appeared, entitled Dogmatik 
(1870), and his Church History (1875). 

4. Jean Paul Richter was born in 1763, at Wunsiedel, Bavaria ; in 1781 

he attended the University of Leipsic, and afterward in poverty 
became a teacher and author. He was remarkably brilliant. It 
has been said that " no writer has made such brilliant remarks, 
and no ten have made so many." His writings comprise sixty-five 
volumes. 

5. Theodore Christlieb (b. 1833) was a man of very remarkable genius 

and erudition. His birthplace was Wtlrtemberg. He studied in 
Tubingen, taught in France, preached in London, and died in 
Prussia. He was Professor of Theology in Bonn. In 1873 he was 
a delegate to the Evangelical Alliance in New York, where he ac- 
quired great fame. In 1874, Dr. Christlieb published in English his 
great work entitled Modern Doubt and Christian Belief, consisting 
of eight lectures of a powerful apologetic character. 

§ f 35. Characteristics of Christ's Miracles. 

I do not hereby deny in the least that God can do, or hath done, mira- 
cles for the confirmation of the Truth. — John Locke. 

With each miracle worked there was a truth revealed, which thence- 
forward was to act as its substitute; . . . for reason and re- 
ligion are their own evidence. — Coleridge. 

It is God's will by means of the miraculous to reveal to men who were 
blinded by sin.— R. Rothe. 

How did men ever arrive at the conception of a miracle if not through 
witnessing the workings of a Divine Omnipotence which was ut- 
terly beyond human comprehension? — Anonymous. 

Miracles can not be believed without a miracle. — Hamann. 

We have seen that Jesus Christ is the central miracle of history. . . . 
The elimination of the miraculous element from the Gospel his- 
tory can never take place without a deep injury or even a total 
destructive alteration of the entire substance of the Christian re- 
ligion. — Christlieb. 

'0 Tlar^p fiov fag- &prc ipyd^erai, Kay& ipyd^op.ai — "My Father worketh 
hitherto, and I work." — Jesus. 

ARGUMENT. 

Miracles, as the attesting signs of Christ's mission and truth proclaimed 
on earth, are to be justly discriminated from the vulgar pretense 
and arts of the magician, sorcerer, or juggler. The one is a re- 
vealing act to authenticate a given truth or fact invaluable to hu- 
manity ; the other is a concealing art which practices deceit upon 



Characteristics and Value of Christ's Miracles. 165 

the natural senses. Miracles are permanent in character and be- 
nign in results ; sorcery is transient and trivial, and worthless 
throughout. So far from having anything in common, they have 
in history proved themselves antagonistic, in that miracles have 
opposed the magician's arts with a destructive energy, and the 
Scriptures not only denounce his procedures as impositions, but 
subjected the magician or sorcerer to punishment. 

The miracles of Jesus are not to be characterized as mere ab- 
stract facts, casually introduced into Christ's life as having a tem- 
porary relation to his work. They belong to, and are identified 
with, the whole redemptive system of Christianity. Contemplated 
aright, they will be found to have been full of benignity and be- 
neficence to men. Miracles are a great factor and force in the 
restorative scheme of human salvation. The words employed in the 
New Testament to express the idea of miracles are " wonders," 
11 works," "powers," "signs:" words so far as words can convey, 
not that which occurs on natural principles which can be explained, 
but that which supernaturally supervenes in attestation of Christ's 
work on earth, and to inspire faith in his restorative disposition 
and power. The miracles of the New Testament are strictly 
Christo-centric in character. 

In God's progressive Eevelation, miracles have an epochal his- 
tory. They were initiative of new eras closely related to the spir- 
itual condition and advancement of the Church. They served to 
inaugurate highly important movements and periods ; and when 
the object of their existence was secured they were retired. Thus 
their evidential value is discoverable in the very structure and 
organization of the Christian system. 

1. Miracles as Discriminated from Jugglery. 

2. Place of Miracles in the Redemptive Scheme. 

3. Miracles as Christo-centric in Character. 

4. Relation of Miracles to Epochs and Progress. 

5. The Evidential Value of Christ's Miracles. 

A just distinction exists between the works known as mir- 
acles and the arts of magician or juggler. In the nature of 
the case it is not possible to make a scientific § 136 ^^^g 
analysis of the internal laws and process which and Magic. 
produce miraculous occurrences, for the insuperable reason 
that they are wrought by supernatural power, which is in- 
scrutable. As was forcibly expressed by Schelling, " Nothing 
is more doleful than the occupation of all rationalists who 
strive to make that rational which declares itself above all 
reason." On the contrary, it is often difficult for a spectator 



166 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

to detect and expose the arts of the magician or sorcerer, who 
conceals completely his methods. Externally, however, both 
may be known by their respective characteristics, trend, and 
effects. The better judgment of every intelligent person intu- 
itively detects any sleight-of-hand tricks as a deception of the 
senses. Indeed, the fact is often avowed, and sometimes even 
exposed as a matter of pleasant entertainment, by the per- 
former himself. But when one attempts to assume the role 
of the impostor, to represent in some sense the interests of re- 
ligion, it appears in its worst possible form, as in the case of 
the so-called "spiritualism" which has been so repeatedly and 
completely exposed as an impious fraud. 

From the time of Celsus until the present there has been a 
disposition, if not a determination, on the part of certain skep- 
tics to identify miracles with the magician's or 
classes Dif- similar arts, when they could be easily refuted. 
This clearly betrays a want of insight into the 
real characteristics which discriminate the two. It is there- 
fore worth while to compare them as to their trend and effects, 
and indicate what possible relation the one sustains to the 
other. This is discoverable in the point of contact, as has not 
unf requently occurred in the history of miracles. 

So far from miracles being one with sorcery, their attitude 
toward each other has been that of open hostility wherever 
they have been found in contact. They are the two camps of 
enemies at war. Sacred history records a standing protest 
against sorcery and all kindred arts. The Mosaic law not only 
denounces the practice, but provides for its instant punishment 
as frauds perpetrated upon the people. 1 Not unf requently the 
worker of miracles was encountered in a given crisis with the 
false pretense and tricks of sorcery. As Jannes and Jambres 
withstood Moses when he wrought miracles in the presence of 
Pharaoh; 2 as the followers of the pagan god Baal publicly 
contested against Jehovah at Mount Carmel, each party call- 
ing down fire from heaven in turn, that the proposed offering 

» Ex. xxii, 18; Levit. xix, 26; Deut. xvili, 9-U. « Ex. vii-xi ; 1 Tim. Ill, 8. 



Characteristics and Yalue of Christ's Miracles. 167 

upon the altar might be consumed, 3 so in the history of the 
New Testament some of the most formidable antagonists of 
the apostles and their work were sorcerers and exorcists. At 
Samaria, 4 Philip the deacon encountered one Simon Magus, the 
magician of fame or infamy, who had acquired a great influ- 
ence over the community ; but no work of wonder is ascribed 
to his power, and he was admitted on repentance to the fel- 
lowship of the early Church. At Paphos, on the island of 
Cyprus, Elymas, a Jewish sorcerer, 5 withstood Paul and Bar- 
nabas in the presence of the ruler, Sergius Paulus, when he 
was smitten with blindness for a time. At Philippi, 6 a slave 
damsel " possessed of a spirit of divination," who brought her 
master great gains, on whom Paul wrought the miracle of dis- 
possession; for which the magistrates commanded Paul and 
Silas to be beaten and cast into the prison and their feet made 
fast in stocks. At Ephesus, 7 certain " vagabond Jews, exor- 
cists," undertook to work miracles over them who had evil 
spirits, in the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, "We adjure you 
by Jesus whom Paul preacheth;" but the man possessed 
leaped upon them and drove them out naked and wounded. 

There is and can be neither identity nor resemblance where 
all is hostile. While the apostles wrought to dispossess and 
give liberty and comfort to the afflicted, the sorcerers were 
trying to retain in servitude the soul of the afflicted for the 
end of gains. The issue between them was complete. Ac- 
cordant with the history of the facts is the teaching of Paul 
concerning " the working of Satan with all power, and signs, 
and lying wonders, and with all deceit of unrighteousness for 
them that perish." As remarked by the distinguished P. S. 
Poole, of the British Museum : 

"As there is no evidence in the Bible of real results having been 
worked by supernatural agency used by magicians, we may draw the im- 
portant inference that the absence of any proof in profane literature, 
ancient or modern, in no way militates against the credibility of the 
miracles recorded in Scripture." 8 

3 1 Kings xviii, 17, et seq. * Acts viii, 5-13. & Acts xiii, 6-12. 

6 Acts xvi, 16, et seq. i Acts xlx, 13-19. 

s Smith's Bible Diet., Hackett's ed., Vol. II, p. 1753, on " Magic." 



168 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

From these facts several inductions are warranted, viz. : 

1. Jugglers of whatever name — exorcists, sorcerers, magi, 
cians, witches, all meaning false arts with possible differences 

§ 138. some m pretense — differentiate themselves in every in- 
inductions. stance of contact from the miracle-worker of the 
Scriptures by the very attitude they so naturally assumed 
toward real miracles, as well as by the arts in which they prac- 
ticed impostures. 

2. In spirit and purpose, which give character to the act, 
jugglers were openly and absolutely hostile to the spirit and pur- 
pose of those who wrought miracles. They are invariably found 
in contention against miracles. 

3. In every instance recorded of antagonisms between them, 
the sorcerer or magician took the initiative in active opposition 
to the movements of the miracle-worker, and was crushed in 
his aggression. 

4. The Scriptures repeatedly denounce the practices of the 
magicians as being criminal, and not only forbade the arts in 
Israel, but affixed to the law in the case the severest penalty 
for the punishment of the impostors. 

5. Jugglery was as selfish and mercenary as it was sinful; 
upon the contrary, miracles were purely beneficent, without 
the hope of reward from any parties. 

6. The arts of the juggler or sorcerer were practiced in 
part to exalt the performer in the esteem of the populace ; but 
miracles were wrought in reverential spirit toward God, in en- 
tire self-abnegation, that men through the power of Christ 
might be brought to realize an endless salvation. 

7. As miracles and sorcery differed in their character, so 
they differed in their results. The effects of sorcery were 
invariably frivolous, degrading, and transient; the effects of 
miracles were invariably spiritual, elevating, and permanent. 
In spirit, in purpose, in power, they differed at every point, and 
agreed in none. 



Characteristics and Value of Christ's Miracles. 169 

So self-evident are these facts that an allegation which 
identified miracles with magic would expose the author to the 
suspicion of superficiality of mind, or downright perversity of 
judgment. 

Dr. Christlieb remarks: 

"The denial of miracles leads to annihilation, not only of Chris- 
tianity, but of all religions whatever." "Many are averse to the mirac- 
ulous through fear of superstition. ... In this they overlook the 
sharp discrimination of Scripture between belief and superstition, be- 
tween miraculous power and witchcraft. Whereas the heathen sorcerer 
pretends to make the supernatural powers subservient to his person, the 
prophet or apostle, if he performs a miracle, accounts himself only the 
instrument of God. . . . Only notice the noiseless unobtrusiveness of 
■miracles in Holy Scripture, the chastity vAth which Christ sharply repels the 
vain curiosity and vulgar thirst of his age of wonders, and his frequent pro- 
hibition of their publication." 9 "A glance at the internal evidences of 
truth in miracles, at the moral and religious character which reflects and 
serves, not only the power of God, but also his truth and holiness, and 
must prove pre-eminently their Divine origin, will show that it is not a 
very difficult task for one to defend his belief in Biblical miracles against 
the charge of superstition. It is a remarkable fact, however, that not 
the believers in miracles, but their deniers, fall most easily into 
superstition." 10 

Dr. Schenkel observes that — 

11 When men no longer believe in God, they begin to believe in 
ghosts ! In truth, there has scarcely ever been an age in which men 
have snatched more greedily after the extravagant than our own, which 
derides the supernatural." u 

It must be remembered that, while a miracle touches with- 
out absolutely impinging upon natural forces, it has to do 
directly with man's internal and spiritual being. § 139 . Mi rac ies 
We err egreffiously and undervalue the worth of and 

00 J Redemption 

miracles when we regard them as mere abstrac- 
tions, apart from any internal relation to Eevelation and Re- 
demption. So far from being detached circumstances, they 

9 Matt, ix, 30; xii, 16, 38,39; xvi, 1-4, 20; Mark, 1, 44; ill, 12. 
io Mod. Doubt, 287, 297, 298. " Was ist Wahrheit f " What is Truth ?" S, 22. 



170 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

were facts incorporated into the redemptive scheme, as their 
internal character and trend imply. As Dr. Christlieb says : 

"Not merely this or that occurrence, but the whole foundation of the 
Gospel history, that is the person of Christ itself, is intrinsically mirac- 
ulous from beginning to end." " For the elimination of the miraculous 
element from the Gospel history can never take place without a deeply- 
penetrating injury, or even a total and destructive alteration of the en- 
tire substance of the Christian religion." 12 

In bodily derangements the remedies known to medical 
science restore to the normal condition of health and vigor. 
So the means employed in redemption contemplate man's 
spiritual restoration to the plan and plane of life intended by 
his Creator. This supposes a supreme loss by reason of his 
lapse through sin. Now, the miracles wrought upon mankind 
in the ministry of Jesus Christ were all in the direction of be- 
neficence ; were in trend restorative to the condition of ordinary 
life ; and in so far they evidence their internal relation to the 
redemptive plan. When the blind were given their sight; 
when the lepers were cleansed from deadly malady ; when the 
lame were conditioned anew to walk ; when the deaf were en- 
abled to hear ; when the dumb had given them the power of 
speech ; when the withered hand was restored whole like unto 
the other; when the sick were lifted from the couch into 
health; when the dead were raised to life again from the 
grave, — every instance was of the nature of a restoration to the 
common estate of mankind, proving both in function and effect 
that miracles were factors in the plan of redemption and cre- 
dentials of the Divine Kedeemer. 

Miracles, in their restorative character which identifies 
them with a great organism, have not always received the 
consideration due to their claim. They have too often been 
treated as mere single occurrences, rather than as coherent 
parts of a great and beneficent system looking to the future 
life. Clearly miracles are not merely the accompaniments of 
a Divine message or of the Divine Messenger, but are an in- 

12 Modern Doubt and Christian Belief, 351. 



Characteristics and Yalue of Christ's Miracles. 171 

tegral part of that organic whole which we call Revelation 
and Redemption. 

In the historical Eew Testament five different words in 
Greek are employed to express the fact and function of mir- 
acles.* They are descriptive and interchange- 
able terms called "signs" as attesting Christ's ' oiogy of 
Messianic character; "wonders" as related to 
him whose "Name shall be called Wonderful;" 1 * "works" 
demonstrative of the character of his kingdom ; and "powers" 
with special reference to the spiritual forces employed to carry 
forward his gracious designs in human salvation. 

In so far as miracles are Christo-centric, they are neither 
natural nor unnatural, but supernatural. Because supernatural 
in character, they are not to be placed in the „„.„,. , 

' J r §141. Miracles 

category of things in nature, or to be judged by as cnristo- 
sensible standards. Miracles are facts to be at- 
tested through the senses by the judgment, yet as an appeal to 
our spiritual nature. They are for our help, but not subjected 
to our understanding. For even the forces of nature, such as 
gravitation and electricity, though known as facts and factors, 
are not in their nature understood. Miraculous occurrences 



* Some examples as illustrations : 

a. "A Sign" (<r7}/jstov, t6) : "Master, we would see a sign from thee. (Matt. 
xii, 38.) " Signs upon the earth." (Acts ii, 19.) " This beginning of miracles did 
Jesus in Cana." (John ii, 11.) "This is again the second sign which Jesus did." 
(John iv, 54. 

b. "A Wonder' 1 ' 1 (davfidcriov, to) : "When the chief priests and scribes saw the 
wonderful things he did, . . . they were sore displeased." (Matt, xxi, 15.) 

Also (Ttya?, r6, "a Wonder "): " I will show wonders in the heaven above." 
(Acts ii, 19.) " Except ye see signs and wonders, ye will not believe." (John iv, 48.) 
" And many signs and wonders were done by the apostles." (Acts ii, 43.) 

c. "A Work" (epyov, t6): "The works that I do in my Father's name, these 
bear witness to me." " Many good works have I showed you from my Father; for 
which of these do ye stone me?" (John x, 25, 32.) 

d. "Power" (dtva/xi?, rj) : " Whence hath this man this wisdom, and these 
"mighty works V (Matt, xiii, 54.) " He did not many mighty works there because of 
their unbelief." (16. xiii, 58.) "Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God unto 
you by mighty works (dtvafAig-), and wonders (ripag-) and signs (<rr)fji.e?op) , which 
God did by him in the midst of you." (Acts li, 22.) 

is Isaiah ix, 6. 



172 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

are helpful for man's recovery from the deprivation and de- 
pravation which sinning has imposed upon human nature ; be- 
ing restorative, they hold an internal relation to Christ's 
kingdom on earth, and to that final consummation when " all 
things shall become new," and man restored shall appear in 
his ancient and original glory. 

a) Accordingly, miracles appertain to the personality of 
Jesus Christ, whose "signs" and "works" they were, whose 
"power" and "wonders" centered in himself as their source. 
As Dr. Christlieb wisely remarks : 

"Jesus Christ is the central miracle of history." " The person of 
Christ itself is intrinsically miraculous from beginning to end." "Asa 
rule, anti-miraculists will not admit this. They imagine that miracles 
and the doctrines resting upon them, merely belong to the outworks of 
Christianity, and that, even if these fall, the essential, that is, the moral 
truths of Christianity, will still remain. I have already sought to show 
how perverted this conception of Christianity is. Christianity in its es- 
sence is not a definite quantity of moral truths or teachings, but a series 
of facts. It is Christ himself, his person and work, the religion of the incar- 
nation of God in Christ, and the redemption of the world therein resulting. 
In other words, Christianity is essentially miraculous. Its Founder, in 
his personality as the God-man, is the Miracle of miracles. . . . Our 
Savior's earthly life and work from his sinless birth to his resurrection 
and ascension — all the chief facts of redemption — are nothing but mir- 
acles." " Miracles can be understood only in connection with the his- 
tory of redemption." 14 

/?) But the Christo-centric character of miracles in the 
Gospels will become the more evident as we contemplate them 
as having their center and source in Jesus alone. They were 
wrought by the exercise of his power. They were wrought 
by himself in person. They were wrought as credentials of 
his character and mission. They were wrought to advance 
the spiritual kingdom of which he was King. They were 
wrought in the interests of those who were his spiritual sub- 
jects. His Golden Eule was: "According to your faith he it 
unto you: all things are possible to God" 15 The final end was 
redemption, of which Christ was the Eedeemer. 

uMod. Doubt, etc., 841, 286, 351. ™ Matt, lx, 29; xix, 26; Mark x, 27. 



Characteristics and Value of Christ's Miracles. 173 

In the idea of redemption and restoration there is presup- 
posed an original order of life and holiness which had been 
violated, involving a ruptured relation with God, and a lapse 
into a condition of helpless degeneracy on the part of the race. 
Sin checked the progressive development marked out in the 
creative plan as a scheme of living, introducing far-reaching 
disturbances, "and death by sin." It is not rational to believe 
that a God of infinite sympathies and affection would not seek 
to remove the disabilities entailed upon Adam's posterity at 
least, who had no part in the original transgression. Surely, 
if God should deliver his ancient people out of Egypt "by signs 
and wonders and by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm/' 
so much the more would he seek to recover a whole fallen 
world from their spiritual bondage. As a part of the redemp- 
tive system, "miracles do not unnaturally break through na- 
ture, but supernaturally through the unnatural" and abnormal 
nature produced by sinning. Accordingly, Christ wrought 
miracles by his own inherent power as the Son of God; for he 
that said to the paralytic, "I say unto thee, Arise, take up thy 
bed and walk," said also to him, " Son, thy sins be forgiven 
thee." 16 

y) Furthermore, in tracing miracles to their source and 
origin, it is to be especially noted that the apostles' miracles 
were wrought in the name of Christ. Their success was inva- 
riably ascribed to Jesus. 17 On all occasions under examination 
they were careful to emphasize this fact. When they wrought 
the first apostolic miracle, on the lame-born at the Gate Beau- 
tiful of Jerusalem, Peter wrought it "in the name of Jesus 
Christ of Nazareth." So far were they from attempting mirac- 
ulous deeds in their own name or power, they expressly dis- 
claimed such power in themselves. They said : 

"Why fasten ye your eyes on us, as though by our own power or 
holiness we had made him to walk? ... By faith in his name hath 
his name made this man strong, whom ye behold and know ; yea, the 



16 Matt, ix, 2-6. " Acts iii, 6, 12, 16 ; iv, 10, 16-19, 30 ; xvi, 18. 



174 Historical Evidence of the JSew Testament. 

faith which is through him hath given him this perfect soundness in the 
presence of you all." Before the Sanhedrin Peter again said: "Ye 
rulers of the people and elders, if we this day are examined concerning 
a good deed done to an impotent man, by what means this man is made 
whole, be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that in 
the name of Jesus of Nazareth whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the 
dead, even in him doth this man stand here before you whole." And when the 
Sanhedrists had conferred together privately, they said : " What shall we 
do with these men, for that indeed a notable miracle hath been wrought 
through them is manifest to all that dwell in Jerusalem, and we can not deny it. 
But that it spread no further among the people let us threaten them, that 
they speak henceforth to no man in this name. And they called them, and 
charged them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus." 13 

These circumstances justify the belief that the miracles of 
the New Testament were Christo-centric and as such were 
incorporated into the redemptive scheme of Christ. 

That miracles were epochal in character is made evident by 
their history. Abraham, the progenitor of the Hebrew race, 
§ 142. Miracles was himself called to place and power in history 
and Epochs, through supernatural means, during that period 
which was characterized by theophanies and visions, which was 
a preparatory period for that of miracles. It extended dis- 
tinctively from Adam to Moses who was the first miracle 
worker. As already seen, in cases of close contact between 
miraculous power and the powers of darkness, so far from col- 
lusion there was collision, and the sorcerer was defeated in his 
opposition. This characteristic marks the development of the 
Jewish theocracy from the beginning. It illustrates what was 
so well said by Kothe : " It is God's will by means of the mirac- 
ulous to reveal himself to men who are blinded by their sins." 
Whenever wickedness had gained an ascendency over or within 
Israel, wonders and miracles were divinely interposed and 
wrought deliverance in the crisis. A new impulse was thus 
given to the theocratic government of God's people, and a new 
epoch was realized in the progress of their religious history. 
Hence, miracles belonged to crises, and marked a new epoch in 

WActsiii, iv. 



Characteristics and Value of Christ's Miracles. 175 

the course of the ancient faith, and produced a new advance in 
the spiritual life of the Church. 

a) When Moses (B. C. 1500) effected deliverance from 
Israel's bondage in Egypt the first epoch of the miraculous 
began in the theocratic nationality. Pharaoh the oppresssor 
with determination opposed the proposition offered him by 
Moses for the freedom of God's people, until the infliction of 
the ten plagues miraculously administered had wrought its 
work, 19 and forced the obdurate and cruel ruler to yield, wisely 
though grudgingly, to the dictates of justice and judgment. 
Through miracles the rights of conscience and freedom of the 
oppressed were obtained. This was clearly in the direction of 
beneficence. Within three months, not only was the exodus 
of Israel accomplished without resort to battle with arms, but 
the Eed Sea had been traversed dry-shod by Israel ; and soon 
the dusky legislator of the mountain came forth from the face 
of God, bearing to his people that wondrous code of laws by 
which he organized more than half a million of slaves from 
Egypt into a formidable nation, destined to become the fore- 
most religious nation of the ancient world. It is the same code 
whose principles are to-day wrought into the government of 
the very best and foremost civilizations of modern times. This 
was the beginning of a new epoch in the history of Israel. 

/?) The second period began in the time of the prophet Elijah 20 
and Elisha, about B. C. 900, when a general apostasy from God 
prevailed. The people of Israel were rapidly becoming fol- 
lowers of the heathen god Baal, when miracles were again 
interposed, the kingdom recovered from its idolatry, and a new 
epoch in the religious life of the Jewish Church was begun. 
The crisis culminated on Mount Carmel; and its result seems 
to have made a lasting impression upon Israel ; for after that 
event no more miracles were wrought until the time of Jesus 
Christ. There was much sinning and no little idolatry prac- 

19 Ex. vii— ix. » 1 Kings xviii. 

12 



176 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ticed thereafter, which called, not for miracles, but for the 
more drastic measure of captivity for seventy years in Baby- 
lon. This wrought a permanent cure of Jewish idolatry. 
"The law and the prophets continued until John;" but the 
Baptist wrought no miracles. 

y) A new epoch opened with the coming of the "Man of 
Nazareth," who is described, by one who knew him well, as 
"a Man approved of God by mighty works and wonders and 
signs, which G-od did by him in the midst" of the people, which 
for magnitude and multitude had never before been known by 
mankind. But the Christian era was not introduced without 
witnessing the pre-eminent crisis brought about by the Jewish 
Church when it rejected alike his works and words, and cru- 
cified his person. Jesus had said unto them : 

" If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not ; but if I do, 
though ye believe not me, believe the works." 21 " If I had not done 
among them the works which none other did, they had not had sin." 22 

This stupendous manifestation of miraculous power on the 
part of Jesus prepared the people for the founding of the Chris- 
tian religion, against which the very gates of hell have not 
been able to prevail. But this gift of power was transmitted 
to the apostles of Christ and the early Church to win and 
sustain their faith in Jesus in his absence, during the first cen- 
turies covering the ten great persecutions of the Christians. 
Then, when miracles had served the purpose of inaugurating 
epochal periods in certain crises of religious history ; when Chris- 
tianity had become established in the world, and reliance was 
effected and realized in the moral and religious faith and ex- 
perience of men, miracles had done their appropriate work, and 
were retired. Thus, as marking special crises and inaugurating 
new epochs for the spiritual progress in religious history, mir- 
acles had their place, and did their work. As Coleridge has 
remarked with discrimination, "With each miracle worked, 



21 John x, 37, 88. « lb. xv, 24. 






Characteristics and Value of Christ's Miracles. 177 

there was a truth revealed, which thenceforward was to act as 
its substitute, . . . for reason and religion are their own 
evidence." ffl 

Faith is justified by evidence. As free and rational beings 
we may be constrained to reason, but can not be forced to be- 
lieve. Proofs are evidential, but not irresistible. 

' § 143. Miracles 

"Whoever wills to doubt, can doubt." But in the and 

presence of the sufficient reason, every rational ^ ence 
being is responsible for his belief in that which he ought to 
believe, when he understands the case. Nevertheless, all evi- 
dences are not of equal worth. Miracles have their value 
evidently, but do not rank as the highest order of proof, nor 
yet as the lowest. Certainly they are not to be disparaged 
and discarded. They are lower in rank than the teachings of 
Jesus, yet higher than the testimony of John the Baptist re- 
specting Christ, whose witness miracles progressively succeeded. 
They were especially adapted to the condition of mankind when 
Jesus appeared among men. 

"Jesus said unto them, Except ye see signs and wonders ye will not 
believe." 2 * "Ye sent unto John, and he hath borne witness unto the 
truth. But the witness which I have is greater than that of John ; the 
very works which the Father hath given me to accomplish, the very 
works which I do, bear witness of me, that the Father hath sent me." 25 
"If I do not the works of my Father believe me not ; but if I do, though 
ye believe not me, believe the works." 26 "If I had not done among 
them the works which none other [man] did, they had not had sin." 27 
"Now, when he was at Jerusalem at the passover, during the feast, they 
believed on his name, beholding his signs which he did." 28 

Obviously miracles were presented by Jesus himself, not as 
the highest order of evidence, but as that which was the best 
adapted to the times, and demanded by their condition, and 
intended as evidence to identify his Messiahship. 

In matters of external evidence, as human nature is consti- 
tuted, we are more powerfully impressed by that which comes 
to us by sensible demonstration, such as miracles furnish, than 

23 Statesman's Manual, Vol. I, 425. 24 John iv, 48. 25 75. v , 36. 

26 lb. x, 37, 38. 27j&. X v, 24. ™Ib. ii, 23. 



178 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

by other methods of conviction; whereas "truth came by Jesus 
Christ,' , the highest authority, in the worthiest form. But the 
Jews rejected his teachings. We are prone to rely upon our 
senses for evidence, when God would have us believe him. 
"The Lord prefers a faith which believes without signs and 
wonders." 39 The disciple Thomas rejected the testimony of 
his brethren that they had seen the Lord after his resurrection, 
and he demanded both ocular and tangible proof as a condi- 
tion of his believing. Jesus accommodated the case, as suffer- 
ing a morbid condition of mind through the dreadful trial of 
the crucifixion; but Jesus instructed him that faith is better 
than sight: "Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast 
believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have 
believed." 80 In the winter, at the feast of the dedication at 
Jerusalem, Jesus was walking on the grounds of the temple 
when the Jews accosted him with : 

"How long dost thou hold us in suspense? If thou be the Christ, 
tell us plainly." Jesus answered: "J have told you and ye believed not; 
the works which I do in my Father's name, these bear witness of me." S1 " If 
I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not sin ; but now they 
have no excuse for their sin." 32 

If miracles in the estimation and design of the Savior were 
not intended to stand alone as matters of evidence, but consti- 
tuted a part of a system, they were certainly meant to be a 
power and have a place in Christ's kingdom. They had a direct 
relation to the person of Christ as credentials of his teaching 
and work. They revealed his identity and power. They all 
looked to the ultimate salvation and glorification of believers. 
When the Baptist had been long shut up in prison, but heard of 
"the works of Christ," not knowing whether the great miracle^ 
worker was the one whom he had baptized, and of whom on 
sight he had borne witness, he sent two of his own disciples 
directly to Jesus with the inquiry ; and Jesus identified himself 
to John's understanding by means of "signs." 

»» Koslin. so John xx, 29. » lb. x, 24, 25. & lb. xv, 22, 24. 



Characteristics and Yalue of Christ's Miracles. 179 

"Go show John again those things which ye do hear and see: the 
blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the 
deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached 
to them." 33 

As credentials, miracles were employed by Christ to pre- 
pare the public mind for his teachings which thereby found 
acceptance. It was thus on "the third day" after their call, 
he wrought the first miracle in Cana of Galilee, " and his dis- 
ciples believed on him," in consequence. 34 With the apostles, 
however, miracles were secondary to the word, and confirma- 
tory of their preaching. Accordingly, as we have it in Mark's 
Gospel, Jesus himself said: "And these signs shall follow 
them that believe." "And they went forth and preached 
everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirming the 
Word oy the signs following." 25 

§ 144. Inductions. 

1. Miracles externally are distinguished from incantation and 
every form of deception by their mutual antagonism found 
in every instance of contact in history. 

2. Miracles internally constitute an integral part of the Chris- 
tian religion, being inseparable from, and having to do 
directly with, the redemption of mankind. 

3. Miracles at once evidence and illustrate the Divine claims 
and character of Jesus Christ as the Messiah touching his 
mission on earth as the Savior of men. 

4. Miracles are Christo-centric, because he is the Source and 
Center of this outreaching power unto men, and after him, 
his apostles wrought miracles in his name. 

5. Miracles serve not only to characterize special crises in re- 
ligious history, but distinguish new epochs in the prog- 
ress of God's Church on the earth. 



33 Matt, xi, 2-5; Luke vii, 19-22. 34 John ii, 1-11. 36 Mark xvl, 17, 



CHAPTER VIII. 

MODEKN OBJECTIONS TO THE HISTOEICITY 
OF MIEACLES. 

I. HlSTOKY OF THE NEGATION OP MlEACLES. 

Chubb — Spinoza — Hume — Strauss — JRenan. 

II. MlEACLES AND THE ABSOLUTISM OF NATUEE. 

1. The Idea of a Miracle. 

2. The Absolutism of Nature. 

3. Nature and our Knowledge. 

4. Absolutism a Fiction. 

5. Nature's Laws Modifiable. 

6. Nature's Laws Antagonistic. 

7. Creation and Science. 

8. Origin of Life on Earth. 

9. A Personal God and Nature. 

III. MlEACLES AND UnIVEESAL EXPEEIENCE. 

1. Terms Universal Experience of Mankind Defined. 

2. Miracles Included as a Part of Universal Experience. 

IV. MlEACLES AND INVESTIGATION. 

1. David Strauss and Investigation. 

2. Ernest Benan and Investigation. 

181 



Chapter VIII. 

MODEKN OBJECTIONS AGAINST CHKIST'S 
MIRACLES. 

§146. Sources: Biographical Epitomes, and Literature. 

1. Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), of Berlin, a scientist of pre- 

eminent abilities, acquirements, and skill. His Kosmos (in 4 
vols., 1845-1859) was his greatest work, scientific in character but 
popular in style ; a work which would immortalize any man. It 
has been described as his "chief work, the most perfect and 
the most characteristic." "It is a wonderful book, stupendous 
in its learning and admirable in its ease." (Peterson.) "With 
him ends a great period in the history of Science ; and that was 
his peculiarity ; he was the end of the period, not the beginning." 
(Agassiz.) 

2. Sir Charles Lyell, of Scotland (1797-1875), a graduate of Oxford, 

England, in 1819, studied law, but, from inclination and taste, 
devoted himself to enthusiastic pursuits, especially geology, in 
which he became pre-eminent. He published his Principles of 
Geology (3 vols., 1830-1833) , which soon became a standard author- 
ity. In 1832 he was chosen Professor of Geology at King's Col- 
lege, London; became president of the Geological Society in 
1836, and again in 1850. In 1863 he published his Geological Evi- 
dences of the Antiquity of Man, in which he supported the "Dar- 
winian Theory " of the Origin of Man. 

3. Justus von Liebig (1803-1873), a native of Darmstadt, Germany, was 

educated at the University of Bonn and Erlangen, and became 
Professor of Chemistry at the University of Giessen and Munich. 
He was chosen president of the Academy of Science at Munich in 
1860, and was made a member of the Academy of Sciences at 
Paris in 1861. Humboldt became his friend, and he was rec- 
ognized in the world of science as the greatest chemist of his time. 

4. James B. Mozley (1813-1878) graduated at Oriel College, Oxford, in 

1834; became Canon of Worcester in 1869, Eegius Professor of 
Divinity at Oxford in 1871 , and was author of several works of 
note, among which was Eight Bampton Lectures on Miracles (1865). 

5. W. B. Carpenter (1813-1885), an eminent English physiologist, Pro- 

fessor of Medical Jurisprudence in the University College, Lon- 

183 



184 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

don, and editor of the British and Foreign Medico-Chirurgical 
Review. " He had few living equals in acquaintance with nat- 
ural science for original inquiry and skill as a scientific writer." 
He was chosen president of the British Association for the Ad- 
vancement of Science in 1872. 

6. J. J. van Oosterzee (1817-1882), born at Rotterdam, Holland; edu- 

cated at the Dutch University of Utrecht ; was chosen Professor 
of Systematic and Practical Theology in the same institution in 
1862. He wrote a number of works of great value, among which 
are a Life of Christ (1865); Christian Dogmatics (2 vols., transl., 
1870) ; Theology of the New Testament (1867) ; and an Essay before 
the Evangelical Alliance at New York, in 1873, on Gospel History 
and Modern Criticism. These are all works of rare worth, pro- 
found thought, and admirable scholarship and skillfulness. 

7. Joseph Ernest Renan (1823-1892), of France, distinguished as a 

philologist and an anti-Christian writer. After winning several 
minor distinctions, he was sent by the Academie des Inscriptiones 
on a literary tour through Italy, of which he was elected a mem- 
ber in 1856; was honored with a scientific mission to Syria in 
1860-1862; then chosen Professor of Hebrew in the College de 
France, which position he soon lost by the publication of his Life 
of Jesus. He was, however, reinstated in 1870, and was chosen a 
member of the Academie Francaise in 1870, Renan died October 
2, 1892. He is most widely known in the literary world by his 
works entitled Origines du Christianisme, Vie de Jesus (1863) ; Les 
Apostles (1866) ; Saint Paul (1867) ; L' Anti-Christ (1873) ; and Marc 
Aurele (1881). His best work was Historie generale des Langues 
Semitiques. His style was brilliant and beautiful, but the contents 
are too imaginary and his postulates relating to the Christian re- 
ligion too gross in the perversion of facts to find acceptance 
among critical thinkers. Criticism has relegated his anti-Chris- 
tian writings to the realms of romance as being utterly unreliable 
and unhistorical. 

§ 146. Modern Objections to the Historicity of Miracles. 

1. The right to deny a priori the possibility of a miracle — if at least one 

believes in a personal and living God — has never yet been proved. 
— Van Oosterzee. 

2. No one is in a position to declare that there is no power adequate to 

the production of miracles, neither can he affirm them to be in- 
consistent with Divine Wisdom and Almighty Power. — Watson. 

3. I will frankly confess that, up to this hour, I have never been able 

to discover a stumbling-block for my intellect in the conception 
of miracles. — Rothe. 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 185 

4. It is, and always has been, a favorite tenet of mine, that Atheism is 

as absurd, logically speaking, as Polytheism ; and that denying 
the possibility of miracles seems to me as unjustifiable as specu- 
lative Atheism. — Huxley. 

5. The common attitude toward miracles is not that of doubt, of hesi- 

tation, of discontent with existing evidence, but of absolute, de- 
cisive, and even unexamining incredulity.— Lecky. 

6. Miracle comes into collision only with the pretended absolutism of 

natural laws, and the idolatry with which Atheism regards it. — 
Bruce. 

ARGUMENT. 

The negation of the miracles of Scripture belongs to modern his- 
tory. Most objections relate to the absolutism of natural forces 
and laws, an unproved postulate. Thence it is inferred that a 
miracle is "a violence to nature's laws," "a rent in nature's sys- 
tem." The most recent theories in opposition to the miraculous 
are two: that they were occurrences which had their origin in 
ancient myths believed by an ignorant and superstitious people, 
or that they were at first the merest legends based on natural 
facts, but exaggerated by early accretions, and traditionally trans- 
mitted to us. Therefore miracles, as such, are imaginary ; they 
never had an actual existence ; they were never subjected to crit- 
ical investigation. 

These objections to miracles are not shown to have a foun- 
dation in facts, are unsupported by proofs, and, indeed, have no 
existence except in the credulity of the objector. Every shift of the 
ground for objection is itself a confession that the older position 
was untenable and is abandoned. It is an opposition based upon 
an & priori aversion respecting the miraculous, which is unscien- 
tific in character and precludes investigation. The idea of a 
miracle is not that of the suspension of a natural force or law, 
much less its violation ; but, leaving the natural in full and act- 
ive operation, a different effect is produced by the introduction 
of the direct power of God, which is the projection of a Higher 
Law. Nor can a miracle be called "an after- thought with God" 
to correct an imperfect creative plan of the universe, but 
God's forethought to rescue man from his abnormal condition 
in consequence of his having sinned. It is clearly the right 
which inheres in God as the law of his Almightiness to exert his 
power to that wisest end of restoring his people from sinful 
wretchedness to that plane of life originally contemplated in 
man's creation. 

1. History of the Negation of Miracles. 

2. Miracles and the Absolutism of Nature. 

3. Miracles and Universal Experience. 

4. Miracles have not been Investigated. 



186 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



The History of the Negation of Miracles. 

There was no denial of miracles during the first four Chris- 
tian centuries. Upon the contrary, the fact of such occur- 
§147. Nega- rences was fully admitted, the kind of miracles 
tions Modern. wr0U ght were designated, and the apostles who 
wrought them were mentioned by name by the early enemies 
of the Christian religion. The history of the negation of mi- 
raculous occurrences began about two centuries and a quarter 
ago. The Deists of Great Britain were the first to hold that 
miracles were unnatural, unhistorical, impossible. Thomas 
Chubb, a leader in the opposition, admitted that certain re- 
markable occurrences did actually happen, but that, in his 
opinion, they were all base deceits and impostures. Benedict 
Spinoza, the Jew, boldly contended for the absolutism of 
nature, on the hypothesis that, nature being a perfect and an 
immutable organization, miracles must be excluded as an in- 
novation. He said: 

" The laws of nature are the only realizations of the Divine Will ; if 
anything in nature could happen to contradict them, God would contra- 
dict himself." 

David Hume, in his celebrated Essay on Miracles, taking 
the hint from Spinoza, followed his trend, and insisted that 
miracles were a violation of natural laws, and therefore in- 
credible. He attempted to refute the proposition of their oc- 
currence on the ground that — 

"Miracles are a violation of the laws of nature. But we learn from ex- 
perience that the laws of nature are never violated." "For miracles 
we have the questionable testimony of a few persons ; . . . against 
them we have universal experience ; therefore this stronger testimony 
nullifies the weaker and more questionable." 

Then afterward, as Natural Science enlarged and explored 
its domain, not Science itself but certain scientists, looking 
exclusively upon the system of nature, became incorrigible 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 187 

materialists, and disallowed the Supernatural place and power 
in the universe. More than sixty years since, David F. 
Strauss, of Germany, affirmed, in his Life of Jesus, that all 
the miracles of the New Testament were resolvable into mere 
myths, as being figments of the ancient imagination. JSTow, 
" a myth is a representation of a religious idea or truth in the 
form of a fictitious narrative." * He did not deny the histor- 
ical existence of Jesus Christ, but rather admitted that he did 
exist and that he was a man of rare genius ; yet all that was 
claimed as supernatural in Christ's birth and person, and all 
that is narrated as miraculous in his history, he held to be 
imaginary representations of religious ideas, and not facts, 
honestly believed by the Evangelists, but without historicity. 
Proofs he did not offer to substantiate his position. This 
would indeed have been the easiest possible disposition to 
make of the case, if it is allowable to settle anything in rea- 
soning by merest assertion, and ignore the facts. But he pre- 
ferred to reflect offensively on the understanding of those who 
differed from his own judgment, and assume the point to be 
proved. He said : " The chief offense which the old system of 
religion necessarily gives to the spirit of our age is its super- 
stitious belief in miracles." 2 Strauss's postulates have been re- 
futed again and again, both by his own countrymen and by 
critical scholars in Great Britain and America. Finally, 
Joseph Ernest Kenan of Paris, professor in the College of 
France, was pleased to believe that the stories of the miracles 
were legends; accounts containing a small amount of history, 
with an enormous amount of fiction. However, this writer's 
utter disregard of the facts of sacred history was so phenom- 
enal when they were against his hypothesis, and his facility 
in substituting his own imagination for facts was so great, that 
his critics assign his writings to the department of "romance." 
Such is the history of the modern opposition to miracles. 

i See Schaff's Person of Christ, pp. 170, 171, 115-118. 2 Leben Jesu, p. 18, 1864. 



188 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Miracles as a Violation of Nature's Absolutism. 

It is important to the discussion of this chapter that the 

following distinctions should be kept carefully in sight. The 

line is clearly drawn between the natural and the 

§148. Impor- J 

tant supernatural as involved in miracles. The natural 

Distinctions. . , , . , . . . n , . 

is the universe and its processes ; the supernatural 
is God and his procedures. The two are to be discriminated 
in thought as in fact, as the Creator is distinguished from his 
creation, as cause is distinguished from its effect. All we 
know of the natural is knowledge derived through the five 
senses ; all we know of the supernatural is derived through 
revelation, whether of works or word. By the laws of nature 
is meant simply that regular method which we observe, in 
which certain phenomena follow certain causes which are 
called forces. By the absolutism of nature is meant the prop- 
osition which holds that the universe is absolutely perfect 
in its organization and laws, and is absolutely independent 
and free from all control whatsoever. This rules out God as 
the Ruler of the universe. The Atheist John Stuart Mill 
wrote : 

" The expression Law of Nature is generally employed by scientific 
men with a sort of tacit reference to the original sense of the word law; 
namely, the expression of the will of a Superior — a Superior in this in- 
stance being the Euler of the universe." "The expression Laws of 
Nature means nothing else but the uniformities which exist among 
natural phenomena ; or, in other words, the result of induction, when 
reduced to their simplest expression." 3 

The famous scientist, Dr. W. B. Carpenter, of Great 
Britain, states : 

" It must be clearly understood that science is nothing more than 
man's intellectual representation of the phenomena of nature, and his 
conception of the order of the universe. That conception is formulated 
in what we term the laws of nature, which in their primary sense are 
simply the expression of the phenomenal uniformities, having no co- 
ercive power whatever. To speak of such phenomenal laws as govern- 
ing phenomena is altogether unscientific." 4 

3 Logic, Bk. ill, c. 4. * Principles of Mental Philosophy, p. 692. 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 189 

A miracle is a supernatural occurrence. It is not effected 
by nature's laws; it is not accordant with nature's laws; it is 
not contrary to nature's laws ; it is not a violation § 149 The Idea 
of nature's laws. All these are fictitious concep- of Miracle - 
tions of the miraculous. To be evident to the senses, a mir- 
acle must touch upon some object in nature, or it could not be 
manifest. It is brought to pass by the direct exertion of 
God's power for the good of man. Being the introduction of 
a new force, it produces a new effect, differing from that pro- 
duced by nature's forces. The forces of nature were never 
more free and urgent in activity than when a miracle was 
wrought; but in such case the natural law did not produce its 
natural effect. When Joshua's hosts crossed the river Jordan 
from the east to invade Canaan, by a miracle the waters above 
were "cut off," or stayed, and the waters below flowed away, 
so that Israel passed over dry-shod. Now, so far from there 
being a suspension of the natural forces or any interference 
with their exercise, those forces were never more powerfully 
exerted than then, but another effect was produced by the intro- 
duction of another Cause. That is, there was a direct causation 
from God in the interests of a wise and beneficent purpose 
toward man. The transaction took place outside of the or- 
ganism of nature as to its source and power ; but there was no 
"violence" done to nature, as was assumed by Hume, and no 
"rent" perceptible, as asserted by Strauss. 

That which is most accentuated by the contestants of mir- 
acles is, that nature's forces and laws are absolute and immu- 
table; that, as a system, it is absolutely perfect, §!5o. Nature's 
unalterable, and inviolate. This postulate neces- Absolutism, 
sitates the exclusion of the living and personal God. It as- 
sumes that, in God's creating nature, he limited himself in his 
own freedom, and ceased to be infinite by such limitation. 
The universe is absolutely independent of God, and warns off 
the Creator. Miracles are impossible. Of course, this is sheer 
assumption. 



190 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Unquestionably, in many aspects of phenomena which fall 
under our observation, there is discernible a constant uni- 
formity in what we call the active operation of nature's laws. 
But we do not know, and no one pretends to know, universal 
nature; and there is in what we know no warrant for believ- 
ing that the regularities which we observe furnish ground for 
the exclusion of miracles. It can not be claimed that we have 
a right to know that the natural activities are always and 
everywhere the same in regularity. Those who have most 
emphasized the absolute immutability and inviolability of the 
universe and its processes, have failed to tell just what the 
laws of nature are, and why miracles would be debarred be- 
cause deranging or violating natural laws. Without knowing 
precisely what the laws of nature are, how can we know what 
will violate them? In the absence of any justifying reasons 
for such belief, the claim must be attributed to mere prejudice 
in advance of investigation, which is not scientific. 

Every intelligent mind acknowledges the obvious fact that 
our knowledge of nature and its processes is as 

§151. Nature ,,..,. . 

and yet extremely limited m comparison with what 

is unknown. X. Bichat, of France, recognized as 
one of the most eminent physiologists of the past century, 
says: 

" The vital properties are at every instant undergoing some change 
in degree and kind ; they are scarcely ever the same." "They are sub- 
ject to a number of varieties ; they baffle all calculation, and would re- 
quire as many formulae as the cases which occur. In their phenomena, 
nothing can be foreseen, foretold, or calculated ; we judge of them only 
by their analogies, and these are in the vast proportion of instances ex- 
tremely uncertain." 5 

Sir Charles Lyell also observes : 

"To say that such leaps as have received the name Atavism [i. e., 
the tendency in generation to return to original species or type] consti- 
tute no interruption of the ordinary course of nature, is more than we 

*Anatomie Generale, Introd. p. xxi. 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 191 

are warranted in affirming. In the case of the occasional birth of an in- 
dividual of superior genius, there is certainly no break in the regular 
genealogical succession ; . . . still a mighty mystery remains unex- 
plained ; and it is the order of the phenomena, and not its cause, which 
we are able to refer to the usual course of nature." 6 

It is further affirmed by the distinguished Kev. H. C. M. 
Watson, of New Zealand — 

"That the operations of nature have never varied is a proposition 
that can not be maintained. A process of necessary reasoning compels 
us to believe that they have varied in the past history of the world. 
The science of Geology witnesses to the truth of this position." 7 

From all the foregoing citations, taken from scientists and 
authorities of the first order, the following facts are derived 
as the basis of further discussion : 

1. The Laws of Nature are nothing else than the expression 
of uniformities of phenomena. 

2. Vital properties in nature are every instant changing in 
both degree and kind. 

3. Interruptions in the course of nature called Atavism are by 
no means uncommon. 

4. Geology witnesses to the fact that the operations of nature 
are certainly variable. 

5. To speak of phenomenal laws as coercive or governing 
phenomena is unscientific language. 

These facts evidence that no man is entitled to affirm that 
natural laws are absolutely regular and immutable, that mir- 
acles should be excluded, as claimed by Hume § 152 Absolut . 
and his admirers. Upon the other hand, if, as ism a Fiction. 
Dr. Carpenter says, " Science is nothing more than man's inteh 
lectual representation of the phenomena, and his conception 
of the order of the universe," and " simply the expression of 
the phenomenal uniformities, having no coercive power what- 

6 Antiquity of Man, c. xxiv. 

Taper read before the Victoria Institute, or the Philosophical Society of 
Great Britain, Vol. XX, p. 224. 

13 



192 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ever," what is the ground on which miracles are excluded? If 
Bichat's statement is indisputable, that vital properties are 
" every instant undergoing change, both in degree and kind," 
what is to be said of physical nature outside of the vital? 
Geology witnesses that invariability in the operations of na- 
ture can not be maintained. What is to be said of those me- 
teoric showers whose irregular occurrence is always taking 
the world by surprise? Such displays do not come regularly 
or constantly. Why, then, should they occur at all under a 
system of laws which is absolutely immutable ? What do we 
know of the hidden causes and conditions lying back of the 
phenomena by which are produced occasionally destructive 
cyclones, terrible earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions — occur- 
rences which come without uniformity, and are surprises in 
time and procedure? Do they not demonstrate changeable- 
ness in both the forces and phenomena of nature? If these 
things do not happen at regular intervals, that fact itself 
denotes deviation instead of immutability in nature. If 
variableness and deviation are found in the causes and condi- 
tions, as well as in time and the mode of procedure, then vari- 
ableness and deviation lie at the very fountain-head of nature's 
laws, and refute the claim that nature is and always has been 
uniform and changeless. In short, the absolutism of nature's 
laws is a purely fictitious claim. ]STo one is warranted in 
denying the possibility of miracles on the ground of the im- 
mutability and inviolability of nature's laws. 

M. Compte declares that "the human intellect is subject to 
the law of an invariable necessity which is demonstrable a 
priori from the nature and constitution of the intellect." On 
the other hand, Huxley indignantly denies the postulate, affirm- 
ing that, " as a matter of fact, the intellect of man has not been 
subjected to the law," as claimed! 8 Here are two disbelievers 
in Christianity antagonizing each other as to the existence of 
a law of nature claimed to be demonstrable. 



8 Huxley on Hume. 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 193 

It clearly can not be maintained that nature is absolute, so 
that any interference or modification is impossible or would be 
a violence which would shock the universe. This 

§153. Nature's 

is perfectly demonstrable, and is done every day. Laws 
The fact is not to be denied that the lower forces 
of nature are constantly counteracted and modified by those 
which are higher ; the mechanical by the chemical, the chem- 
ical by the vital forces. 9 In such cases it is not correct to say 
that the feebler force is in any sense suspended or annihilated ; 
rather it becomes co-operative in securing ends not attainable 
by itself. The higher laws or forces are constantly modifying 
the lower ones in the system of nature, to our greatest advan- 
tage, and this modification and counteraction are also employed 
in the mechanical arts. This principle may be variously illus- 
trated. 

A seed germinates in the soil, developing a vegetable organ- 
ism above ground; the animal consumes the vegetable organ- 
ism and man consumes both the animal and the vegetable or. 
ganisms ; but where is the shock administered in the universe % 
Through long days and nights the tree holds out the fruit on its 
tireless limb, in constant exposure to the sun's light and 
warmth, to secure the silent chemistry which makes for its 
proper development and ripeness. Meanwhile gravitation 
grapples and tugs with all its inherent power to draw the 
fruit down to earth; but a stronger force of adhesion holds 
the fruit fast in the grasp of the tree, until the ultimate end 
is accomplished. By due process, the adhesive force weakens 
its grasp, and the stronger force overcomes, and the fruit at 
length descends into the lap of earth. In this battle of the 
forces there is mutual victory and defeat ; but there is neither 
"violence" nor "shock" to the laws of nature. An artisan's 
skill places overhead the ceiling of a room, and ever after- 
ward, without an instant of break, the force of gravitation is 
tugging at every square inch of that broad ceiling; but gravi- 

^Lay Sermons, pp. 156, 157. 10 See Murphy on Habit and Intelligence, I, 88. 



194 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

tation is again overcome by the stronger force, permanently, 
without the slightest evidence of shock or violence. A mag- 
net attracts iron filings, and holds them aloft despite the draw- 
ings of gravitation; the greater force overcomes the weaker 
force. It is natural for water to run downhill; but, by means 
of the siphon, man compels it to run uphill. These are not 
miracles; but they refute the claim that the laws of nature 
are absolute, and admit of no modification or change without 
violence. So man at his will controls the effect of natural 
forces wherever he employs steam to traverse the ocean, or 
uses electricity to propel the trolley-car. The higher force of 
man's will puts the other natural forces to a new purpose. 
But no law is suspended ; nothing is done contrary to nature ; 
but a new effect is produced. If a man can do so much, how 
much more the will and power of the infinite God! It is the 
admirable remark of Dr. Schaff: "The control of nature by 
the will of man is no miracle, but it involves all the specula- 
tive difficulties which are urged against it by materialists and 
Atheists." 

But there is still another aspect of the case which chal- 
lenges consideration. As already seen, the miracles of Christ 
.■ „ . „ . were restorative* in trend and effect. When the 

§ 154. Nature's 

Laws An- yellow f ever begins its ravages in a given commu- 
nity, all the remedies known to the healing art 
are invoked to stay its destructive work and exterminate the 
ghastly evil. Here is an antagonism in the forces of nature, 
between the forces of life and the forces of death. Is this 
very antagonism to be cognized as a part of nature's supreme 
perfection and immutability, that its harmony would be dis- 
turbed and rent by the performance of a miracle to the same 
end? Kecovering from a deadly disease means the recovery 
of man from his abnormal to his natural condition. There are 
laws which are promotive of life and health; and there are 
laws which are promotive of disease and death; and these are 



* See chap, vii, $ 189. 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles 195 

contrary the one to the other. If there are maladies to be 
suffered, there are also remedies for our restoration. If, now, 
it be claimed that all these instances cited merely illustrate a 
normal state of facts in the natural law, in which one force 
operates to overcome another force which is resistive, and that 
the system of nature includes all such modifications and an- 
tagonisms in its legitimate workings, then in what consist this 
absolute perfection and harmony, in distinction from derange- 
ment and discord, that miracles should be excluded ? 

But now let the claim be admitted. Then three facts are 
to be carefully noted : (1) It is a surrender of the contention 
that any modification or interference with the ordinary activ- 
ities of natural forces is a violence or outrage to nature. (2) 
It legitimates the question, If man interfere with and modify 
the action or results of natural law, as he certainly does, how 
and why is it impossible for the Infinite God to do so likewise ? 
(3) It prepares the way for the distinct assertion that miracles 
can in no proper sense be affirmed to be violative of natural 
forces. Kather, they are analogous to the healing art. They 
are beneficent in purpose. They contemplate restoration to 
the creative plan of life for man. 

In order that this objection against miracles shall have 
validity at all, it must be assumed that nature is now, as ever 
since creation, in its normal condition of absolute § 155 Laws of 
perfection and immutability which miracles would contrariety, 
violate. But evidently natural phenomena do not always prove 
that that condition exists. For there are natural laws of con- 
trariety and antagonism which must be taken into the account. 
As already seen, there are forces which are constantly at war. 
When volcanoes disgorge their fires, whole cities are over- 
whelmed with destruction and desolation, as were Pompeii 
and Herculaneum before Mount Yesuvius in A. D. 79. When 
earthquakes rock the globe, calamity and waste follow in the 
track. Famine stalks the land, peering into every hut and 
palace, only to fill the land with distress. Pestilence breathes 



196 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

across continents, and whole populations disappear from the 
earth. There are laws which are instinct with the power of 
life and happiness, and there are laws which are instinct with 
the power of death and wretchedness. How do all these mis- 
eries experienced — mental, moral, and physical — these laws of 
contrariety and absolute antagonism, illustrate and prove the 
absolute perfections and harmonies of nature? In all this 
silent war of forces which fill the air and earth, why should it 
be thought that miracles, which come to our relief, bringing 
beneficence to cure some of our worst evils, should be ex- 
cluded? Is it a rational belief that the world should be kept 
in an abnormal condition of suffering ; that men should have 
eyes without sight, ears without hearing, hunger without food, 
life without health, mind without reason, when miracles come 
to relieve and restore the afflicted to the common condition of 
mankind? Is it rational to impute violence to the Lord of 
life, who, with that sweetness of spirit which has never been 
paralleled by any mortal man, when moving among the lowly 
and wretched of our race to relieve them of their unnatural bur- 
dens of life ; so that, at his touch the sightless eyes began to see ; 
at his word the speechless tongues began to speak ; at his com- 
mand the loathsome leprosy instantly disappeared, the wasted 
forms of men were lifted into the joys of health ; that this 
lowly Nazarene, with a tenderness which seems infinite, deliv- 
ered those who were bereft of reason from those unnamed and 
unknown tortures of mind experienced by the insane, and 
restored them to a peaceful spirit and to the fellowship of 
friends? Would it be better to preserve inviolate this specu- 
lative theory than that four thousand men, besides women and 
children, who were out in the wild desert's waste, after suffer- 
ing from three days' hunger, "having nothing to eat," than 
that Jesus should, with such dignity, benignity, and benefi- 
cence, so rend nature and do violence to its laws, by feeding 
the multitude by multiplying the loaves and fishes! "Woe to 
those who call evil good, and good evil ; that put darkness for 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 197 

light, and light for darkness." Is not the postulate itself the 
very extreme of superficiality and absurdity? 

It is the discriminating remark of Dr. Philip Schaff that — 

" We are told that miracles are impossible. This is an d priori 
assumption and pseudo-philosophical prejudice, in the face of the Apos- 
tolic Age, the whole Bible, and the common belief of mankind in all 
ages. It is an unproved dogma turned against the facts." n 

Truly has Dr. Yan Oosterzee observed: 

11 The right to deny d priori the possibility of a miracle — if at least 
one believed in a personal, living God — has never yet been proved." 12 

It is to be noted that science knows nothing of creation, as 
it invariably begins with organization. What seons intervened 
between the two, no living man can tell. But to § 156. creation 
speak of the Genesis of the world as the product and Science - 
of chance, is simply preposterous, and forestalls all scientific 
investigation. Mr. Mozley observes : 

" Science is not opposed to the idea of creation, because all that is 
essential to the integral notion of creation is a beginning ; and a begin- 
ning is not and can not be disproved. . . . Taking the facts of 
nature as they stand, and abstracted from any hypothesis respecting 
them, the introduction of all the species were generally exertions of a power 
different from the course of nature. J ' 13 

It was the sagacious remark of John Stuart Mill, that 
"The laws of nature do not account for their own origin." 14 
It was the characteristic remark of Thomas Carlyle, in his 
work on Frederick the Great, that "Atheism truly he never 
could abide. To him, as to all of us, it was flatly inconceiv- 
able that intelligent, moral emotion could have been put into 
him by an entity which had none of its own." 15 Thirty years 
ago much was said among scientists respecting the origin of 
life without the office of the living Creator. The doctrine of 
spontaneous generation was stoutly held by Huxley on his dis- 
covery of "Bathybius" which he defined as "a vast sheet of 

^Person of Christ, p. 99. ^Dogmatics, Vol. II, 565. 

13 Transactions of Victoria Institute, Vol. XX, p. 222. 
li Logic. ^Biography, B. 23, c. 14. 



198 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

living matter enveloping the whole earth beneath the seas;" 16 
and about the same time Hackel discovered the existence of 
"Moneron" which he understood to be "very minute non- 
nucleated corpuscles forming the simplest living organisms." 
These two substances were supposed to bridge the impassable 
chasm between inorganic and organic matter; between the 
lifeless and the living nature ; so that, starting with the idea 
of the eternity of matter, the doctrine of creative acts by a 
living and personal Creator could be absolutely set aside. In 
1872, Strauss admitted that, unless the introduction of life 
could be accounted for on natural grounds, a miracle must 
have occurred at the beginning of life. He wrote : 

11 Huxley has discovered the Bathybius, a shining heap of jelly on 
the sea bottom ; Hackel, what he calls Moneres, structureless clots of 
albuminous carbon, which, although inorganic in their, constitution, yet 
are all capable of nutrition and accretion. By these the chasm may be 
said to be bridged, and the transition effected from the inorganic to the 
organic. As long as the contrast between the inorganic and organic, lifeless 
and living nature, was understood to be an absolute one; as long as the con- 
ception of a special vital force was retained, there was no possibility of span- 
ning the chasm without the aid of a miracle." 17 

The greatest microscopist, Professor Lionel Beale, and the 
greatest physiologist, Dr. W. B. Carpenter, both of London, 
from the very first rejected Huxley's great discovery of 
Bathybius as an unscientific conclusion. In 1869, Dr. Wal- 
lich, of London, in the Monthly Microscopic Journal, made an 
exposure of the unscientific character of Huxley's claim for 
his Bathybius from scientific data. Meantime the ship Chal- 
lenger made deep-sea soundings, gathering new evidence 
against Huxley's doctrine. In 1874, Professor Beale in his 
work on Protoplasm — a work mentioned by the Worth Amer- 
ican Review as " one of the most remarkable books of the 
age" — says in reference to Bathybius that — 

"Instead of being a widely-extending sheet of living protoplasm 
which grows at the expense of inorganic elements, it is rather to be 
regarded as a complex mass of slime with many foreign bodies and the 
debris of living organisms which have passed away." 

^Microscopic Journal, 1868, cited by Joseph Cook, Biol. p. 2. 

W The Old Faith and the New, $48. See Joseph Cook's Boston Lccts., Biol. pp. 2, 8. 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 199 



The German Naturalists' Association at Hamburg, in 1876, 
repudiated Bathybius ; and soon, according to Professor Dana, 
of Yale University, in the American Journal of Science and 
Arts, 18 Huxley himself surrendered his discovery as being an 
empty pretense, an unscientific conclusion! Such was the end 
of the "fact" which was to be the golden bridge which was 
to relegate the doctrine of a supernatural Creator and super- 
natural miracles to the myths of oblivion ! Tyndall exploded 
the hypothesis of spontaneous generation. 

It is now easy to understand why Humboldt in a letter to 
a friend once wrote : 

"What I do not like in Strauss is the scientific frivolity with which 
he finds no difficulty in accepting the generation of organic matter from 
inorganic, or even the formation of man from some primeval slime." 19 

The confession of Strauss is now in place : 

"As long as the contrast between the organic and inorganic . . . 
is an absolute one, as long as the conception as a special force [i. e. a 
Creator] was retained, there is no possibility of spanning the chasm 
without the aid of a miracle." 

Since, as Mill observes, "the laws of nature § 157 , origin 
do not account for their own origin," what is of Life, 
to be said of the Origin of Life? Strauss said in 1872: 



"Miracle must be confessed to have occurred once at least at the intro- 
duction of life, unless some method of filling up the chasm between the 
dead and the living forms can be found." 20 

.Not only has the chasm not been filled, but the notion is 
absolutely abandoned, and the voice of scientists is now 
universally against the notion as frivolous to affirm that there 
is possible a spontaneous origin of life. 

Hackel conceded that " most naturalists of our time give up the 
attempt to account for the origin of life by natural causes." 21 DuBois 
Raymond says: " It is futile to attempt by chemistry to bridge over the 
chasm between the living and the not-living." Huxley said: "If the 
theory of evolution is true, the living must have arisen from the not- 
living." " The chasm between the living and the not-living, the present 

18 See Joseph Cook, Biology, pp. 2-4. ^Letters to Vamhagen, 4th ed. p. 117. 
20 Old Faith, etc., $ 48. ^Hist. of Creation, Vol. I, 327. 



200 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

state of knowledge can not bridge." 22 Sir William Thomson declares: 
"This seems to me to be as sure a teaching of science as the law of 
gravitation, that life proceeds from life, and nothing but life." ^ Kant 
said: "Give me matter and I will explain the formation of the world; 
give me matter alone, and I can not explain the formation of a cater- 
pillar." 24 Tyndall said: "If we look at matter as defined for genera- 
tions in our scientific text-books, the notion of conscious life coming out 
of it can not be formed by the mind." " Life came only from antece- 
dent life. . . . Either let us open our eyes to the conception of 
creative acts, or, abandoning them, let us radically change our notions 
of matter." 26 Dr. Liebig wrote: "Some philosophers have affirmed that 
life has existed from eternity. Natural science has proved that at a 
certain period the earth in temperature was such that no organic life 
could exist, and that therefore it must have had a beginning." 26 Muller 
says: "Only a miraculous interruption of the natural laws can form a 
living organism out of lifeless matter." Dr. Schenkel says: "The 
already existing harmony of nature is as little annihilated by the 
appearance of an absolute creative act of God in the world, as is 
humanity itself by the entrance of anew personality." 27 Dr. Carpenter 
stated : " The convertibility of physical forces, the correlation of these 
with the vital, and the intimacy of that nexus between mental and 
bodily activity which, explain it as we may, can not be denied, all lead 
up to one and the same conclusion — the source of all power in mind." 28 
Or, as expressed by W. E. Grove: "Causation is the will, creation the 
act of God." 29 Dr. Christlieb says: " How did the first living organism 
originate ? Modern science has unquestionably demonstrated that life 
did not always exist on earth and Cuvier long ago confidently main- 
tained this to be the case, and that we could easily indicate the point 
of time when life began." "And not only does the entrance of higher 
forms of life interrupt the chain of natural causes ; for within the dif- 
ferent grades of existence themselves, we see the laws broken by 
exceptions in certain points." 30 

So, then, there was a beginning of life on earth, and the 
essential idea of a creation is a beginning; and all life is 
dependent on antecedent life. Scientifically considered, this 
was a beginning ; theologically, it was a creation. Whatever 
it may be called, it was a supernatural intervention and change 
wrought on all precedent natural conditions. What, then, is 



w-Encycl. Brit.: Biol. 

23 Inaugural Address before British Association, Nature, Vol. IV, 269. 
24 Cited by Joseph Cook, Biology, p. 40. ^Belfast Address. 
™Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung, 1856. 27 Christliche Dogmatik, 258. 
^Mental Physiology, c. xx. MJEssay on the Correlation of Physical Forces. 

™Mod. Doubt and Christian Belief, 303-305, note. 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 20i 

the warrant or value of the thought which supposes that, 
when God created the universe, he narrowed himself down to 
limitations in freedom, power, and prerogative to that which 
he had created, so that he can not work miracles? Mtzsch 
has happily remarked, "Miracles belong to a higher order of 
things, which is nature also? Creation was a radical and 
revolutionary innovation as respects all prior conditions of 
nature. The new and unseen Force which was introduced 
was as silent and certainly as powerful as that which germi- 
nates the seed in the soil, or marks the bursting forth of bud 
and bloom in springtime, or illustrates itself in the falling of 
the sunshine which we can see. For at last all nature's 
activities and laws are but effects, referable to the one Divine 
First Cause. But in what intelligible sense was the beginning 
an innovation to be held as "a rent" or "a violence" on pre- 
existent nature? 

Mtzsch justly observed that "the denial of miracles in- 
volves the denial of the free, living, personal God;" or, as 
expressed by Dr. Christlieb, "He that believes in § 158# concep- 
God as a free, living, personal Will, has settled tionsof God. 
for himself the possibility of miracles." Deism is the con- 
ception which separates God from the universe which he 
created, and holds that nature upholds itself and controls its 
activities by virtue of its own laws, without the intervention 
and power of God. Materialism, on the contrary, identifies 
God with matter as one, in that complete sense that it denies 
all separate and spiritual existence, negativing God as a Spirit. 
Pantheism is that conception of God which holds that he is 
identical with the world, so that outside and beyond matter 
he does not exist; that he is the Soul of the universe, and all 
nature is his body. So far from God being a living, self-con- 
scious personality, he is the merest It — a somewhat having 
power without intelligence. Of course, such conceptions of 
the Almighty Godhead are incompatible with the possibility 
of miracles. 



202 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



Miracles Contrary to Universal Experience. 

Mr. David Hume, of England, was the apostle of this propo- 
sition. It is said to have been originally perpetrated as a joke 
to worry a Jesuitical priest, who had just reported to him in 
conversation a miracle wrought by the Eomanists. After- 
wards, however, thinking that he had thought better than he 
meant, he amplified his argument in an Essay on Miracles, in 
which he says : 

"For miracles we have the testimony of a few persons ; against them 
we have universal experience ; therefore, this stronger testimony nulli- 
fies the weaker and more questionable." 

Notwithstanding the sophistry of this position has been 
often exposed, Strauss thought his "Essay on Miracles was so 
universally convincing that he [Hume] may be said to have 
settled the question ! " 

Now, precisely what is meant by "universal experience?" 

It is defined as " the uniform and undeviating experience of all 

mankind in all ages of the world." The definition 

§159. Miracles y J 

and is fair. But it may properly be asked, When, 

and how, and by whom has the consensus of "the 
universal experience of all mankind in all ages of the world" 
been taken? And who is the responsible custodian of the re- 
port made? It is easily shown that the "experience of men" 
on different parts of the globe is often variant, and sometimes 
diametrically the opposite. The experience of mankind in 
the torrid zone would attest the fact that snows are never 
known to fall, or frosts to blight, or water to congeal into ice ; 
but experience in the Arctic Zone would attest that the earth 
is universally bound up solid in the embrace of perpetual 
snows and ice, where is nothing green, and glint exists. If it 
be claimed, however, that in the universal experience of the 
whole heathen world in all the ages past, miracles have never 
been known, the fact may be conceded without a word of con- 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 203 

tention. But the affirmant has surrendered his own premise 
of "universal experience." The experience of the heathen 
world is very far from being "the universal experience of all 
mankind in all ages of the world." Very obviously, if we are 
to find miracles at all among men, we must find them where 
they occur, and not where they are utterly unknown. As a 
matter of evidence, one might as well demand to see icebergs 
at the line of the Equator before he will believe that they 
exist, as to demand Christian miracles in the outside heathen 
world. It should he carefully noted that the postulate which 
excludes the history of miracles wrought in the Jewish nation 
and during the first four centuries of the Christian era within 
the Roman Empire, does not, nor can he, admitted to represent 
u the universal experience of all mankind in all ages of the 
world." Upon the other hand, it may be safely affirmed that 
universal experience does not sustain the postulate that mir- 
acles never occurred. We know heathen experience only by 
its history ; by the same canon of belief we learn of miracles 
in the Christian world. To omit the experience of the only 
valid witnesses in the case, would resemble "the play of 
Hamlet with Hamlet left out!" To prove a given crime by 
witnesses, the fundamental question would be, not who did 
not see it, hut who did. The testimony of the whole wit- 
nessing Church of God on earth, with its centuries of ex- 
perience in history, solemnly attests that miracles were 
wrought within "the universal experience of all mankind in 
all ages of the world." It is much to the advantage of the 
argument, that miracles were never once denied in those cen- 
turies where and when they occurred, and hy those who were 
most entitled to know. Upon the contrary, as we have seen, 
miraculous occurrences are distinctly admitted, the kind of 
miracle wrought was designated, and the names of those who 
wrought them were given, by those who were enemies of the 
religion which produced them. 



204 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



Mlracles Have Never Been Investigated. 

Nothing has been more put forward as a stock expression 
by a certain class of ^believers than that miracles were 
never subjected to investigation. Is this true, indeed? Then 
miracles have been rejected without investigation/ "He that 
judgeth before he heareth is not wise." Both Strauss of Ger- 
many and Kenan of France issued this broad challenge. 

Dr. David Strauss wrote : 

§160. Strauss " If the friends of the miraculous would explain to 

on us the working laws [of miracles] as clearly as we know 

Investigation. the lawg wh i c j 1 govern the action of steam, we should 
then consider their arguments as something more than mere talk." 31 

Confessedly, the spirit of this gibe, intended for those who 
differ with Strauss, does not happily illustrate a philosophical 
mind in search of truth. He should have known that if the 
higher law of the supernatural could be explained, that 
fact would take the case out of the category of the super- 
natural at once ; it would not be a miracle. Truly did the 
skeptical Schilling say: "Nothing is more doleful than the 
occupation of all rationalists who strive to make that rational 
which declares itself above all reason." We do not explain 
"the working laws" of our own natures, how thought co-ordi- 
nates with the sensibilities and with the human will, resulting 
in the external action ; nor do we have to understand all this 
inter-relation and inter-action in order to believe any given 
fact. We do not believe how the grass grows ; but we believe 
that it grows, nevertheless. Who has ever explained the inter- 
nal "working laws" whereby the acorn is converted into the 
oak? Nature is full of mysteries which were never understood, 
but which we all accept and believe. Test microscopically and 
chemically, as you will, two eggs of different species, which, 
however, so far as discernible, are exactly alike in appearance, 
in weight, size, color, substance, in quality, and quantity. The 

si Cited in Modern Doubt, etc., 323. 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 205 

one egg invariably hatches the bird, the other the serpent. 
Now, in return, an explanation of nature is in demand. Is 
the fact to be deemed incredible because it is inexplicable? 
Can we explain, not the external conditions, but the internal 
origin of life in the egg ? No man has ever yet explained the 
"working laws" involved; nevertheless every man believes 
the fact when it occurs, unless he is an idiot. Until one can 
explain the phenomena of nature, or of life, or of history, he 
debars himself from all right on this ground to object a priori 
to the possibility of miracles. Kightfully does Christlieb say: 

"We now demand of those who reject the miraculous that they 
shall explain to us, from natural causes, all the phenomena in nature 
and history. If they can not do it, they have no right to contest the 
possibility and the historical nature of the miraculous. . . . Un- 
belief has yet to find a satisfactory explanation for the most important 
facts in history. The more thoroughly it investigates, the less can it 
conceal this. . . . And what is, then, the last resort for deniers of 
the miraculous ? When the connecting links in nature no longer suffice, 
they are feign to recur to chance. . . . But to take refuge in chance 
is the death of all scientific investigation." 32 

In one of Joseph Ernest Kenan's later works, entitled 
The Apostles, he says : 

"It is an absolute rule of criticism to deny a place in history to nar- 
ratives of miraculous circumstances. . . . Such facts have never 

been really proved. All the pretended miracles near aHM _ 

, , J , ,, . .,, . . §161. Renanon 

enough to examine are referable to illusion or 1m- investigation. 

posture. If a single [modern] miracle had ever been 
proved, we could not reject in a mass all those of ancient history ; for 
admitting that very many of these last [modern miracles] were false, we 
might still believe that some of them were true. But not so. Discus- 
sion and examination are fatal to miracles. Are we not, then, author- 
ized to believe that those miracles which date centuries back, and re- 
garding which there are no means of forming a contradictory debate, 
are also without reality ?" 33 

a) Two things very remarkable occur in this paragraph. 
One is that M. Renan, as a critic, should reject that which is 
true because of the false ; should disallow the money of the 
genuine bank because of its counterfeit; should disown the 

33 Christlieb, Modern Doubt, 329, 330. « Introduction, p. 37, Amer. ed. 1879. 



206 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ancient miracles of history because of modern pretenses con- 
fessedly false. This evidences a strange lack of discrimination 
in judgment. Another characteristic is, that he accentuates 
that "discussion and examination are fatal to miracles," but 
respecting " those miracles which date centuries back . . . 
there are no means for forming a contradictory debate." If 
ancient miracles can not be opposed by reason in debate, why 
reject them without reason? 

Just what kind of evidence M. Renan demands when he 
says, "Such facts have never been proved," it would be in- 
teresting to know. If he means historical proof of such oc- 
currences has not been adduced, he is certainly much at fault 
as a Professor of History. There are concessions and clear 
affirmations, and no contradictions made by Jews and heathen 
directly to the contrary, as we have seen. These attestations 
of the fact of miracles come from those who were even more 
hostile to Christianity than was M. Renan. But they had 
this advantage of this writer ; they were the contemporaries 
of the miraculous events, and knew what they were writing 
about far better than one living in the nineteenth or twentieth 
century. We have the testimony of the Jewish Talmud, the 
Toledoth Jeshu, the Antiquities of Josephus on the one hand, 
and on the part of the heathen, the testimony of Celsus, of 
Hierocles, and of Julian the Emperor, confirmed by the testi- 
mony of a document written by an Arab, reconfirmed by the 
witness of Tertullian, Quadratus, Origen, and a host of Chris- 
tian writers of that period. These speak of facts which oc- 
curred where and when they were living, or near that time; 
and M. Renan gives us his mere opinion, without justifying 
reasons, to overthrow the testimony of these witnesses ! No 
amount of denial on the part of a disbeliever who knows 
nothing of the facts in dispute can cancel the historical state- 
ments of those who were contemporaries of the miraculous 
occurrences. It is sheer dogmatism thus to deny. It certainly 
requires more than M. Renan' s dictum to establish it "as an 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 207 

absolute rule of criticism, to deny a place in history to narra- 
tives of miraculous circumstances." He is severely criticised 
by scholarly writers for his facile methods of substituting the 
vagaries of his own imagination for facts touching the trans- 
actions recorded in the historical New Testament.* 
ft) M. Kenan further remarks: 

"Miracles only exist when people believe in them. ... A 
miracle at Paris, for instance, before experienced savants would put an 
end to all doubt ! t A miracle never takes place before an incredulous 
and skeptical public, the most in need of such convincing proof. Cred- 
ulity on the part of the witness is the essential condition of a miracle. 
There is not a solitary exception to the rule that miracles are never 
produced before those who are able or permitted to discuss and criti- 
cise them." u 

Renan has welded together as one the silly pretense 
of the modern and the historical miracles of the apostles. 
He refuses to separate them as of altogether different char- 
acter. His remark, therefore, is a gratuitous sneer unbecom- 
ing the courteous Frenchman, and a cheap contempt for 
Christianity to come from a gentle philosopher. It indicates 
a vice of mind which disqualifies the writer for taking a fair 
view of things which come within the domain of sacred 
history. It is his misfortune that in matters relating to the 
Christian religion he is interested less in the facts to be sought 
than in their denial. To say that miracles exist only when 

*Dr. Tischendorf says of Renan's writings: "This theory of the rise of the 
Gospels has culminated in a piece of botchwork, . . . issued from the Paris 
press in 1863. The author, . . . not troubling himself . . . respecting the 
share which the apostles may have had in delineating the Gospel portraits, but 
following his own self-imposed theories about miracles and revelation, has dis- 
played boundless recklessness, and given way to the most unbridled phantasies 
respecting the Gospel history, caricaturing both it and its Hero. He has written 
a book which has much more the character of a shameless calumny of Jesus than 
of an honest investigation into his career." (Origin of The Four Gospels, pp. 27, 28, 
Amer. Tract Society.) 

+ Christlieb says to this: " Perhaps before the French Academy? We would 
remind those who feel inclined to submit to its decision as infallible that this 
body in former times rejected (1) the use of quinine, (2) of vaccination, (3) 
lightning conductors, (4) the existence of meteorites, (5) the steam engine." 
{Mod. Doubt, p. 324, n.) 

m The Apostles, p. 37. 
14 



208 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

people believe in them, is even better than to disbelieve in 
them when they actually occur. 

The statement of this Professor of History in the Uni- 
versity of France is historically inexact according to the only 
authentic documents we have on that subject. The history of 
miracles in both the Old and New Testament is an open and 
standing contradiction of his whole position. Test the fact 
from the very first instance unto the last. When Moses and 
Aaron stood before Pharaoh, 35 that ruler called in his " ma- 
gicians with their enchantments" to confront and contest the 
validity of the miraculous signs evidencing a message from 
God. The contestants broke down completely in the conten- 
tion, and acknowledged that the wonders wrought by Moses 
were wrought " by the finger of God !" The narration must 
stand as authentic until the claim is refuted. Does it prove 
that "credulity on the part of the witness was the essential 
condition of a miracle?" When Elijah on Mount Carmel 36 
met the eight hundred and fifty priests and patrons of the 
god Baal, to test and contest whether Baal or Jehovah was 
the true God, in the presence of the miraculous sign in sacri- 
fice, when fire fell from heaven at the prayer of the prophet, 
the unwilling people who saw it fell upon their faces and 
cried aloud, "The Lord he is God; the Lord he is God." 
What, then, becomes of Kenan's famous assumption that 
"Credulity on the part of the witness is the essential condi- 
tion of a miracle ;" and " miracle never takes place before an 
incredulous and skeptical public, the most in need of convinc- 
ing proof?" 

Turn to the history of miracles in the New Testament. 
The first miracle wrought by the apostles* was that wrought 
upon the person of the lame-born at the Gate Beautiful, at the 
temple grounds at Jerusalem. The man was instantly cured 
by the word of Peter, in the presence of adversaries. But 
what was of more importance was the fact that, when Peter 

*That is, after those of Pentecost, Acts ii, 43. 
85 Exodus viii, 19, etc. 86 1 Kings xviii. 



Modern Objections Against Christ's Miracles. 209 

and John had been arrested and arraigned before the Sanhe- 
drin, which sought to suppress the apostles and their work, 
they were constrained to confess: "What shall we do with 
these men? for that a notable miracle hath been done by 
them is manifest to all that dwell at Jerusalem, and we can 
not deny it" w What, then, is to be thought of the reckless 
statement that " There is not a solitary exception to the rule 
that miracles are never produced before those who are able 
and permitted to discuss and criticise them !" The same con- 
ditions were present in the course of Christ's own ministry. 
When Jesus cured "the sick of the palsy," the opposing 
scribes did not deny the miracle, but said, "This man blas- 
phemeth;" but " the multitudes saw it, . . . and glorified 
God who had given such power to men." 38 When he pro- 
posed to raise the dead daughter of Jairus, the ruler of the 
synagogue, those that stood by "laughed him to scorn," but 
when it became an accomplished fact they were silenced 
and amazed at what had been wrought. 39 Even the Pharisees 
did not attempt to deny his miracles, but admitting the fact, 
ascribed the power to the devil! 40 

In the light of history there is no justification to be offered 
for Kenan's frivolous and unhistorical remark that " a miracle 
never takes place before an incredulous and skeptical public." 
Whatever is done in historical investigation, we can not and 
must not attempt to change the facts of history. We can not 
play fast-and-loose with the Christian facts which are to be 
investigated. As to the sacred narratives, we must either ac- 
cept the accounts as they stand, or refute them with judgment 
in open, fair, and scholarly criticism. On this point Dr. Christ- 
lieb says: 

"Kenan proceeds to contest the actuality of all Scriptural miracles, 
maintaining that no miracle has been established as such, and that ' all 
supposed miraculous facts which we have been in a position to examine, 
have proved to be delusions and deceptions.' This result, of course, is 

«7Actsiv,16. 38 Matt. ix, 1-8; Mark ii, 3-12. 39 Mark v, 40-42 ; Luke viii, 41, 42, 58-56. 
«> Matt, xii, 24; Mark iii, 22,23; Luke xi, 15. 



210 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

obtained in the most facile manner, by simply changing the facts which 
are too stubborn to evaporate into delusions, into myths and legends.' * 
" The man who calmly affirms that no miracle has appeared before those 
who are capable of criticising it, and who thus declares that the entire 
Jewish and Roman world, with all their learned and wise men, among 
whom Christ and his apostles did so many [miraculous] signs, to have 
been utterly incapable of forming a true judgment in regard to them, — 
such a man simply gives vent to the presumption of the nineteenth cen- 
tury, which, on so many questions, arrogates to itself the monopoly of 
'competent criticism.'" 41 

y) It may now be assumed that the distinction between 
the Natural and the Supernatural is drawn with sufficient 
clearness, and that the laws of nature for their existence and 
maintenance refer us to the Divine Mind as the one and su- 
preme Author. The following inferences are therefore legiti- 
mated : 

1. The Absolutism of Nature is a claim which is not, and never 
was justified by proofs. 

2. It is unscientific to hold that natural laws are coercive, or 
exclusive of miracles. 

3. The lower forces of nature are never suspended or anni- 
hilated by the higher forces. 

4. Miracles do not suspend or supersede the natural forces, 
but simply supplement them. 

5. If man has power to modify the effects of natural laws, much 
more has the Infinite God. 

6. The work of Creation and the Origin of life on earth were 
supernatural occurrences. 

7. Universal experience in all ages includes, but never excludes, 
the fact of miracles. 

8. The history of miracles develops the truth that they were 
always open to investigation. 

41 Modern Doubt, etc., 325. 



CHAPTER IX. 
PASSION, DEATH, AND BURIAL OF JESUS CHRIST. 

I. Incidents of His Passion : 

Testimony of Celsus, Porphyry, Toledoth Jeshu, and the Jewish 
Talmud. 

II. Incidents op His Death : 

Celsus, Talmud, Toledoth Jeshu, Josephus, Lucian, Hierocles, 
Tacitus, Mara, and Dr. Heinrich Graetz. 

III. Incidents of His Burial: 

Celsus, Tacitus, Rabbi Frey, R. Abrabanel. 

IV. Confirmation of Adversaries' Testimony by Christian Writers : 

a) Testimony of a Christian Apostle: Paul. 
j8) Testimony of Apostolic Fathers: Barnabas and Ignatius. 
7) Testimony of Christian Apologists: Aristides, Tertullian and 
Jerome. 

V. Inductions from the Facts and Evidence Adduced. 

211 



Chapter IX. 
PASSION, DEATH, AND BUEIAL OF JESUS CHKIST. 

§ 162. Sources: Biographical Epitomes, and Literature. 

(Adversaries.) 

1. Lucian (A. D. 120-200) was born in Samosata, Syria, and flourished 

in the reign of the Emperor Hadrian (117-138). Under the guise of 
a narrative he assailed the Christians and the Christian religion 
with wit and ridicule in a letter written to one Chronis, in which 
he indulged in both fiction and a parody representative of the 
death of one Proteus or Peregrinus as being a Christian. He has 
been critically characterized as "a brilliant but frivolous rheto- 
rician," " an Epicurean, worldling, and infidel, . . . who could 
see in Christianity only one of the many vagaries and follies of 
mankind ; in miracles, only jugglery ; in the belief of immortality, 
an empty dream ; and in their contempt of death, and brotherly 
love of Christians, to which he was constrained to testify, [only] a 
silly enthusiasm." (Schaff.) 

2. Henry St. John, Lord Bolingbroke (1678-1751), was an English 

statesman and author, who made himself quite notorious by his 
hostility to Christianity in the first half of the eighteenth century. 
He was content to resolve " all morality into self-love as the first 
principle and final center" of human interest. That is, he put 
himself in the place of God ! " He was educated at Eton and Ox- 
ford, and was extremely dissipated in youth." " He was brilliant 
and versatile, but not profound." "His collection of works have 
but little merit except style." (Johnson's Cyclop.) 

3. Edward Gibbon (1737-1794), who attained great fame as an historian. 

In youth he studied at Westminster and Oxford ; became a Ro- 
man Catholic ; renounced his Catholicism and religion in 1754, 
and became and continued a confirmed skeptic. He made great 
acquisitions in both classic and French literature. One day, while 
musing in Rome, and the barefooted friars were engaged in their 
vesper devotions, the thought first occurred to him to write his 
history of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. He pro- 
ceeded at once to begin the work, which he executed during 1776- 
1788, when it was published. The best editions are those edited 

213 



214 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

either by William Smith, or that by Milman. Able as the work 
certainly is in so many respects, in critical opinion he is regarded 
as exceedingly unfair toward the early Christians, magnifying 
their frailties into faults, and being seemingly incapable of ap- 
preciating their virtues or their proper claims of conscience. He 
was utterly pitiless of the martyrs for the truth, and had no sense 
of their rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. 

(Friends.) 

4. The Apostolic Fathees were so named because they were the im- 

mediate pupils of the apostles, and, at the same time, the first 
Fathers of the Christian Church. They were, therefore, both con- 
temporaries and successors of the apostles, and the connecting 
link between the Apostolical and the Primitive Church. They did 
not claim theopneustia (inspiration) in their work as did the apostles, 
nor was it ascribed to them by the Church. Their simple function 
was to reproduce and hand down the apostles' teachings as they 
had been taught by them. Sometimes the writings of the Apos- 
tolic Fathers were read in the Churchly assemblies, but their writ- 
ings were not considered as a part of the Canonical Scriptures, but 
as friendly and Christian counsel to enforce the apostles' teach- 
ings. The evidential value of their writings in Christian history 
is great, for the reasons that they were for years the personal 
associates of the apostles, and, after them, were the first re- 
cipients of apostolic teaching and the media through whom 
those teachings were transmitted to us ; that they were at once 
the custodians and witnesses of the apostolic Scriptures and doc- 
trines, which they had received in both an oral and a written 
form. They treat the writings of the apostles with profoundest 
reverence as being the exclusive authority for the Christian 
Church. They based their own teachings upon the apostolic 
doctrines. 

5. Barnabas (70-79) was not the companion of Paul (Acts xiii, 1, 2), but 

one of the earliest writers of the Apostolic Fathers. He is only 
known in his Epistle, which is a curious document, but of very 
evidential character. "There is no reason to believe that he 
received his appointment to the apostolate directly from the Lord." 
(Westcott, Canon of N. T. 42.) "Our opinion is that these arguments 
are fatal to the authorship of [the Apostle] Barnabas or any other 
apostle. It is quite possible that some Alexandrian Christian by 
the name of Barnabas may have written [this Epistle], for the 
work is evidently of Alexandrian origin ; its cast of thought and 
mode of exegesis being such as could hardly have arisen else- 
where." (Cruttwell's Literary History of Early Christianity, I, 
48, 49; 1893.) The Epistle was written in Greek and was found 
attached to the celebrated Sinaitic Manuscript of the New Testa- 



Passion, Death, and Burial of Jesus Christ. 215 

ment discovered by the celebrated Dr. Teschendorf in the St. 
Catherine Convent in 1859, " beginning with the fourth page where 
Eevelation ends." (Salmon.) It contains twenty-one brief chap- 
ters. It witnesses to the existence of a written Gospel in A. D. 70-79. 
The date of this Epistle is not absolutely certain ; but critical 
opinions assign the document to the sub-apostolic age, in the sev- 
enth decade ; but some so late as A. D. 138. 

a) Those placing the date of 'Barnabas } s Epistle in the second 
century are: 

Westcott : "Not before the beginning of the second century." ( Canon, 42. ) 

Fisher: "Very early in the second century." (Beginnings of Chris- 
tianity, 278.) 

Kayser, Baur, Milller, and Lipsius : A. D. 107-120; Hefele, 137. (Schaff, 
Ch.ffist. n,679,n. 2.) 

Tischendorf: "About 117." (Origin of the Four Gospels, 155, 163.) 

Valkmar : " Under Hadrian ;" i. e., A. D. 119-138. 

Crooks: "About 125-150." (Letter.) 

/?) Those ascribing the Epistle to the first century are; 

Hilgenfeld, Reuss, Ewald, Weizsacher, Weiseler, and Funk: "At the close 

of the first century, or before 79." 
Milligan: "Soon after the destruction of Jerusalem" [70]. (Schaff, 

Ch. Hist. II, 678.) 
Cruttwell : " 70-132 " A. D. (Lit. Hist, of Early Christianity, 48, 49.) 
Hilgenfeld : " Under [the emperor] Nerva, 96-98." (Cruttwell, I, 49.) 
Smith and Wace : " Only a few years after the destruction of Jerusalem ;" 

i. e., A. D. 70. (Diet. Christ. Biog.) 
Bunsen: "About fifteen years before the Gospel of John." (Hippolytus 

and his Age, I, 54.) 
Ewald, Weizsacher, Cunningham: " Not many years later than Vespasian," 

70-79. (West. Can. 42 n. 1.) 
Holzmann : "The Epistle to Hebrews and the Epistle of Barnabas, writ- 
ten about the same time." (Cited by Watkins, Bampt. Lects., 1890.) 
Bishop Lightfoot: "We should probably place the date . . . between 

70-79." (Apos. Faths. 241, ed. 1891.) 
Professor Salmon: "We must ascribe it to the reign of Vespasian, A. D. 

70-79." (Introd. 513, 518.) 
Harman: " It must have come down from the first century." (Introd. of 

Scripts. 515, and n.) 

The date here given for the Epistle of Barnabas is the seventh 
decade of the first century, which would be about forty years after 
the ascension of Christ, and about fifteen years after the publica- 
tion of the Gospels. The special value of this document is the 



216 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

citation it makes of Matt, xx, 16 ; xxii, 14, in the exact words of the 
Evangelist, under the formula "It is written" which is the earliest 
testimony of the written Gospel known. 

6. Marcianus Aristides (wrote 123-139) was a philosopher of Athens, 

who is mentioned by Eusebius (Eccl. Hist. IV, c. 3) as the contem- 
porary of Quadratus. He describes Aristides as "a faithful man 
of our religion, who left an Apology of our faith, as Quadratus did, 
addressed to Hadrian." Jerome corroborates Eusebius, and relates 
that after Aristides became a Christian, he still continued to wear 
the philosopher's garb, and that he presented to Hadrian " a book 
containing an account of our sect, that is an Apology [or Defense] 
for the Christians, which is still extant; a monument with the 
learned of his ingenuity. " (De Illustrious Viris, I, 20.) 

This Defense of Aristides was lost for centuries, but was re- 
cently recovered in its complete form. An Armenian transla- 
tion, discovered in 1878, was the first document brought to light. 
K6nan, with his characteristic repugnance to Christianity, de- 
nounced the document as spurious. In 1889, Rendal Harris, of 
Philadelphia, while traveling in Syria, discovered at St. Catherine 
at Sinai a Syrian manuscript containing a translation of the long- 
lost Apology of Aristides. Its accordancy with the Armenian trans- 
lation is such as completely substantiates the identity and authen- 
ticity of this Apology. But there is this curious discrepancy: the 
Syrian manuscript makes it clear that the document was originally 
addressed to Antoninus Pius (139-161), instead of Hadrian (117-138) 
according to the Armenian document and the statement of Eu- 
sebius, and also Jerome. The Syriac gives the writer's full name 
as Marcianus Aristides. "Now, this name is otherwise known as 
that of a Christian of great authority in Smyrna, living about A. D. 
138-140." (Cruttwell, Literary Hist. I, 292.) A point of principal 
interest contained in this Apology is the early formulation of the 
"Apostles' Creed," though not in its complete form. 

7. Lactantius (250-330) was a rhetorician and orator of great distinction. 

The Emperor Diocletian invited him to settle in Nicomedia as 
Professor of Eloquence. This was about A. D. 301. About 312, 
Constantine brought him to court in Gaul, and appointed him the 
teacher of his own son Crispus. Lactantius commanded a culti- 
vated style, and possessed withal remarkable power of expression. 
Jerome characterizes him as " the most learned man of his time." 
He witnessed the cruel persecutions of the Christians for their 
faith, but without sharing their sufferings, and was well prepared 
to write in defense of his reviled religion. Lactantius was called 
" the Christian Cicero." His principal work was his Divine Insti- 
tutes, which was at once a refutation of paganism, and a Christian 
Apology — a work which he dedicated to his friend and patron Con- 



Passion, Death, and Burial of Jesus Christ. 217 

stantine the Great as the first Christian emperor. In his work 
entitled De Movie, or Mortibus Persecutorum, if he is the author, 
he denounced Nero's cruelties to Diocletian, Galarius, and Maxi- 
minius, invoking God's judgments upon the persecutors. 

8. Jerome (Sopronius Eusebius Hieronymus) was born at Stridon, on the 
confines of Dalmatia, between 331 and 342. He is recognized as the 
connecting link between the Eastern and the Western Churches. 
The child of Christian parents, he was carefully educated under 
Donatus, the famous heathen grammarian, and Victorinus, a dis- 
tinguished rhetorician. He traveled extensively abroad. But he 
dovoted himself most devoutly to the studies and labors of an 
ascetic monk. He attached to his cause many converts in a re- 
markable manner, especially Koman ladies of the patrician fam- 
ilies, to whom he expounded the Scriptures, and induced many to 
become nuns. In 386, Jerome, with Paula and her daughter Eus- 
tochium, settled in Bethlehem in Judaea. Paula, being a patrician 
of wealth and distinction, built three convents for nuns, and one 
for the monks, over which Jerome presided. Here Jerome trans- 
lated the Bible into the Latin, now known as The Vulgate edition. 
Jerome died at a great age of fever, about the year 419 or 420. 

PASSION, DEATH, AND BURIAL OP JESUS CHRIST. 

The death of Christ is so distinctly foretold in the fifty-third chapter of 
Isaiah that I am forced to believe that Jesus, by a series of pre- 
concerted measures, brought on his own crucifixion in order that 
his followers might appeal for supernatural proof to the ancient 
prophecy . — Bolingbroke . 

If the life and death of Socrates were those of a sage, the life and death 
of Jesus were those of a God. — Kousseau. 

It was something far deadlier than death. — Farrar. 

For Christ suffered for sin once, the Righteous for the unrighteous, that 
he might bring us to God. — Peter. 

And when [Pilate] knew it from the centurion, he gave the dead body 
to Joseph. — Mark. 

Now, in the place where he was crucified there was a garden, and in the 
garden a new sepulcher wherein was man never yet laid. There 
laid they Jesus, . . . for the sepulcher was nigh at hand. — 
John. 

Ilap^Sw/ca yap vp.lv iv Trpdroig- 6 ical irapk\afiov, 8tl XpHrrb? airedavev virkp t&v 
ap.apTi£jv yjixdv Kara ra? ypa<p&? ical 6tl kra<p7\. — "For I delivered unto 
you, first of all, that which I also received, how that Christ died 
for our sins, according to the Scriptures ; and that he was buried." — 
Paul. 



218 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



ARGUMENT. 

The argument now proposed is to prove, not merely that the facts known 
as the passion, the death, and burial of Jesus Christ actually 
occurred, together with certain incidental circumstances accom- 
panying, but especially that the record of these particulars in the 
historical New Testament is a truthful and authentic account of 
those facts. They were all recognized and acknowledged by those 
who were pre-eminently hostile to the faith. One especial object 
is to substantiate by adversaries that the death of Jesus was real, 
and that despite the malice of men — at the instigation of the Jews 
and by the execution by the Romans — Jesus died in the interests of 
mankind. It was the gracious design of God to save men through 
his death, without reference to the mode or manner of it. Hence 
the doctrine of an Atonement for sin, and the Redemption offered to 
mankind through the suffering Savior, were cardinal in the Chris- 
tian religion from its origin, and furnish no possible room for any 
supposable accretions of myths or illustration of legends. More- 
over, these doctrines were propagated by the apostles, and so en- 
tered into the very structure and purpose developed in the Scrip- 
tures of the New Testament, substantiating, on the Christian side, 
the antiquity, authenticity, and Divinity of those Scriptures. 

1. Incidents of Christ's Passion. 

2. Incidents of Christ's Death. 

3. Incidents of Christ's Burial. 

The celebrated descriptive portraiture by Plato of his ideal 
§163. Plato's "Just and Righteous Man" has a striking appli- 
justMan. cability to Jesus Christ in his humiliation and 
final sufferings. He says : 

"A man of true simplicity and nobleness, resolved, as iEsculapius 
says, not to seem, but to be good. We must certainly take away the 
seeming; for if he be thought to be a just man he will have honors and 
gifts on the strength of his reputation, so that it will be uncertain 
whether it is for justice's sake, or for the gifts and honors, that he is 
what he is. Yes, we must strip him bare of everything but justice, and 
make his whole case the reverse of the former [i. e., the unjust man al- 
ready described]. Without being guilty of one unjust act, let him have 
the worst reputation for injustice, so that his virtue may be thoroughly 
tested and be shown to be proof against infamy and all its consequences, 
and let him go on to the day of his death steadfast in his justice, but 
with a lifelong reputation for injustice. After describing the men [the 
just and the unjust] as we have done, there will be no further difficulty 
in proceeding, I imagine, to sketch the kind of life which awaits them 
respectively. They will say that in such a situation the just man will be 
scourged, racked, fettered, will have his eyes burned out, and at last, 
after suffering every kind of torture, he will be crucified." 1 

1 Plato's Republic, Book 11, cited by Davies and Vaughan; also Mair's Chris- 
tian Evidence, p. 371. 



Passion, Death, and Burial of Jesus Christ. 219 

Eousseau, one of the most prominent skeptics of the 
eighteenth century, says of this sketch: 

" When Plato paints this imaginary Righteous Man covered with all 
the opprobrium of crime, and worthy of all the rewards of virtue, he paints 
feature for feature Jesus Christ. The resemblance is so striking that all 
the Fathers felt it, and it is impossible to mistake it." 

Some facts of especial character now challenge attention 
respecting the close of our Lord's earthly life. They require 
careful consideration as being cardinal points in § 164 Pacts 
the system of Christianity. Fortunately the tes- in Hand, 
timonies of the early adversaries are available, pointed, and 
valuable in determining the time and place of the occurrence 
and incidental circumstances relating to the passion, death, and 
burial of Jesus. Celsus is remarkably full and frequent in his 
references to details as we find them recorded in the Gospels, 
although, with a strange perversity of mind even in a heathen 
philosopher, he seeks to interpret facts to the disadvantage of 
Jesus. Worse than all, his frequent sneer is hardly becoming 
one who professes to be a philosopher wishing to investigate 
Christianity. He often evidences a bitter spirit toward Jesus 
and the Christians, designating Christ as an " impostor," 2 while 
Lucian calls him a "Sophist," 3 a term which he often uses in a 
good sense; and Porphyry mentions "Jesus Christ as a man 
illustrious for his piety, and who was more powerful than 
^Esculapius and all the other [Greek] gods." 4 

Incidents of His Passion. 

a) Keferring to the Savior's retirement to Gethsemane for 
prayer, Celsus says : 

" Why does he mourn and lament and pray to escape § 165 * ? e r ? h " 
the fear of death, expressing himself in terms like these : ciples. 

k O Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me ? ' " 5 
" How should we deem him to be a God . . . who was found attempt- 
ing to conceal himself, and endeavoring to escape in a most disgraceful 
manner, and who was betrayed by those whom he called his disciples ? " 6 

2 Cels. i, 68, close ; ii, 55. » Schaff, Ch. Hist. II, 95. 

4 Colonia,§7, cited in Lard, vii, 445. 

6 Cels. ii 24, comp. Matt, xxvi, 39. *Ib. ii, 9. 



220 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

" No good general or leader of great multitudes was ever betrayed ;" but 
" Jesus, having been betrayed by his subordinates," did not govern well, 
but " deceiving his disciples, produced in the minds of the victims of his 
deceit," not even the good will which " would be manifested towards a 
brigand chief." 7 Celsus professes to believe that any one "who was a 
partaker of a man's table would not conspire against him, much less 
would he plot against a God, after banqueting with him ;" 8 and he fur- 
ther asks: "How is it [possible] that if Jesus pointed out beforehand 
both the traitor [Judas] and the perjurer [Peter], they did not fear him 
as a God, and cease the one from his intended treason, and the other 
from his perjury ? " 9 The Toledoth Jeshu also says that " Jesus was be- 
trayed by Judas." 

/?) Celsus refers very distinctly to several incidental circum- 
stances which, occurred in connection with the crucifixion. He 

§ 166. Christ's aC ^ S : 

Sufferings. « ^ those who mocked Jesus, and put on him the pur- 

ple robe and the crown of thorns, and placed the reed in his hand." 10 
When the Christians " declare the Logos to be the Son of God," they 
"do not present to view a pure and holy Logos, but a most degraded 
man, who was punished by scourging and crucifixion." u The Tole- 
doth also mentions that " he was crowned with thorns." The Jewish 
Talmud asserts that, "After they had put on his head a crown of thorns, 
and the Jews and also the soldiers had mocked him, and afterward he 
was condemned to die," M etc. 

y) As regards Celsus, Origen in his reply says : 

" In the next place, throwing a slur upon the exhortations spoken and 
written to those who have led wicked lives and who invite them to re- 
pentance and reformation of heart," Celsus "asserts that we say that ' It 
was to sinners that God has been sent. 5 " 13 " He who was a God could 
neither flee nor be led away a prisoner, and least of all could he be de- 
serted and be delivered up by those who had been his associates, and had 
shared all things in common, and had had him for their Teacher who was 
deemed to be the Savior, and the Son of the greatest God." 14 " O sincere 
believers ! you find fault with us [heathen] because we do not recognize 
this individual as God, nor agree with you that he endured these [suf- 
ferings] for the benefit of mankind." 15 "Again, if God, like Jupiter in 
the comedy, should, on awakening from a prolonged slumber, desire to 
rescue the human race from evil, why did he send this Spirit, of which 
you speak, into one corner [of the earth] ? He ought to have breathed 
it alike into many bodies, and have them sent out into all the world. 
. . . But do you not think that you have made the Son of God more 
ridiculous in sending him to the Jews?" 16 

TCels. ii, 12. »Ib.ii, 21. <>7&.ii, 18. ™i7>. ii. 34. 1116.11,31. 

12 Semachoti, 11, 9. 1 3 Cels. Iii, 62. « lb. ii, 9. » lb. ii, 88. " lb. vi, 78. 



Passion, Death, and Burial of Jesus Christ. 221 

The Toledoth Jeshu also affirms that Jesus taught that " his 
blood should atone for the sins of mankind, and that he appro- 
priated to himself the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah." (For de- 
tails of Crucifixion, see Excursus G, vii.) 

Celsus again obviously misrepresents and holds up to ridi- 
cule certain Christians as " inspired persons " who claimed to 
have Christ formed within them the hope of glory, when he 
says it was " for the purpose of attracting attention and ex- 
citing surprise" before the public, but really with the latent 
sneer in reference to Christ's return to earth to judge the world. 
He says : 

"These are accustomed to say, ... I am God; I am the Son of 
God, or I am the Divine Spirit. I am come because the world is perish- 
ing; and you, O men, are perishing for your iniquities! But I wish to 
save you ; and you shall see me returning again with heavenly power. 
Blessed is he who now does me homage. On all the rest I will send down 
eternal fire, both on cities and on countries. . . . But they give occa- 
sion to every fool or impostor to apply them to suit his own purpose." 17 

§ 167. Recapitulation. 

The earliest adversaries of Christianity here witness to the 
existence of the disciples of Jesus ; to the fact that he did re- 
tire to the garden of Gethsemane ; to his prayer of agony ; to 
his betrayal by Judas ; to his having been deserted by friends ; 
that he was led away by his captors as a prisoner ; that he was 
denied by Peter ; that he was scourged by Pilate ; that he was 
mocked by Jews and soldiers ; that he was robed in a purple 
garment; that he was crowned with thorns; that a reed 
was placed in his hand; and that he was mocked and then 
condemned to die. These circumstances, related to Christ's 
passion, are here attested substantially as recorded in the 
New Testament. Moreover, an enemy of Christ witnesses 
that he was " a man illustrious for his piety," and more pow- 
erful in the impression which he made upon the world 
and for the influence which he exerts upon mankind than 
all the heathen gods together; that he was the Teacher 

" Cels. vii, 9. 



222 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

of the people ; that, notwithstanding the infamies intended to 
be cast upon his name both by the mode and associations of 
his death, he was " deemed to be the Savior, and Son of the 
greatest God ;" that the sufferings and death of Jesus were be- 
lieved to be in the interests of mankind ; that he was regarded 
as the Son of God sent to the Jews, and who, in the cruelties 
endured, made an atonement for the race. Here we about 
twenty particular facts and incidents attested just as they are 
found in these Christian Scriptures. They are taken from the 
writings of Celsus, the Toledoth Jeshu, the Jewish Talmud, and 
from the witness of Porphyry — the earliest and worst enemies 
Christianity ever had to encounter. 

Incidents of His Death. 

It should be particularly observed that, when the Roman 
soldier offered Jesus the "vinegar and gall" on the cross to 
§ 168. Christ's deaden his mortal pains, the potion was instantly 
Last Moments, rejected ; 18 but afterward, when the "vinegar" 
alone was proffered him to allay the intense thirst induced by 
his passion, it was promptly received. 19 The sufferings im- 
posed in crucifixion were endured without mitigation. The 
Messianic prediction was thus fulfilled : " They gave me gall 
for my meat, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to 
drink." 20 To these two distinct potions the rabbinical works 
respectively refer, confirming the sacred narrative. 

The Talmud affirms that " after he [Jesus] was condemned 
to die, they gave him the cup of wormwood, that he should 
not feel the pangs of death. This mercy to drink wormwood 
is written in Abel Eabbati or Semachoti? 1 The Toledoth Jeshu 
says, "They gave him vinegar to drink." Celsus, probably 
from ignorance of this Jewish custom, mistakes when he con- 
founds these two potions as one, and misrepresents the fact 
that Jesus accepted the vinegar, but rejected the other. More 

18 Matt, xxvii, 34; Mark xv, 23. 

w Matt, xxvii, 48; Mark xv, 36; Luke xxiii, 36; John xix, 29, 80. 

2° Psalm lxix, 21. 21 Semachoti, c. ii, 9. 



Passion, Death, and Burial of Jesus Christ. 223 

probably, he was not willing to make the just discrimination. 
Origen, in citing Celsus, indicates how he colored the facts 
saying that he "makes the vinegar and gall a subject of re- 
proach," adding : 

" He rushed with open mouth to drink of them, and could not en- 
dure his thirst as any ordinary man frequently endures it. 22 " For what 
better was it for God to eat the flesh of sheep or to drink vinegar and 
gall than to feed on filth ¥ 32S " The Christians, making certain addi- 
tional statements to those of the Jews, assert that the Son of God has 
been already sent on account of the sins of the Jews, and that the Jews, 
having chastised Jesus and given him gall to drink, have brought upon 
themselves the Divine wrath." 24 

Paulus of Heidelberg, and other skeptics of that school, 
have been pleased to believe the unproved conjecture that 
Jesus did not really die on the cross, but swooned 

J ' § 169. His 

away. If there was no death, there was, of Death Actually 
course, no resurrection. Special attention, there- 
fore, is directed to this point in the account as given in the 
sacred narrative, and is so decisively confirmed by adversaries, 
who also note certain extraordinary circumstances which im- 
mediately followed that event. The testimony adduced takes 
cognizance of circumstances leading up to the crucifixion; 
that it Avas effected at the instigation of the Jews ; that the 
mode of his death was inflicted by the Komans ; that he was 
executed by Pontius Pilate, who was procurator of Judaea ; 
that he was put to death at Jerusalem in Palestine ; that the 
time of its occurrence was in the reign of Tiberius Caesar; 
that the occurrence happened on the occasion of the Jewish 
Passover, and the exact hour was at three o'clock in the after- 
noon, when the evening sacrifice was slain. No historical 
event of the remote past can be authenticated by better evi- 
dence than that given by enemies, who identify the parties 
involved, the time, the place, the occasion of a given occur- 
rence, and the rulers of the hour. All these facts concur in the 
death of Christ. 

22 Cels. ii, 37. »» lb. vii, 13. 2 *Z&. iv, 22; comp. John xix, 28-30. 

15 



224 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

a) His Crucifixion. Josephus says : 

" When Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men among us, had 
condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not 
forsake him." * Lucian testifies that Jesus was " a crucified Sophist;" 
and adds of the Christians of that day: "They still worship that great 
man who was crucified in Palestine. . . . Moreover, their first Law- 
giver taught them that they were all brethren when once they had 
turned and renounced the gods of the Greeks, and worshiped their 
Master who was crucified, and engage to live according to his laws." 26 
Hierocles says that " Christ was apprehended and crucified." ^ 

P) His Heath. Celsus says : 

" Those who were his associates while alive, on seeing him subjected 
to punishment and death, neither died with him nor for him ; . . . 
whereas now you [Christians] die along with him." 28 " Seeing you are 
so eager for some novelty, how much better it would have been if you 
had chosen as the object of your zealous homage some one of those who 
died a glorious death," rather than " one who had ended a most infa- 
mous life by a most miserable death." 29 

The Talmud places the death of Jesus definitely at the 
time of the yearly service of the Jewish Passover, which ac- 
cords with the Gospels. It says : " The tradition is that on 
the evening of the Passover, Jesus was hanged [upon the 
cross]; they hanged him on the eve of the Passover." 30 
The rabbinical work called Toledoth Jeshu confirms the state- 
ment : " Jesus was crucified and died on the eve of the 
Passover." Tacitus, the celebrated Koman historian, states : 
"Christ, the founder of that name, was put to death as a crim- 
inal by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judaea, in the reign of 
Tiberius " 31 Caesar. 

A Syrian document of late discovery named Mara, which 
is of extra-Biblical character, is one of the very earliest 
heathen writings of the period. In reference to the Jews and 
their relation to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, this document 
reads : 

" What benefit did the Jews obtain [by the execution] of their wise 
King, seeing that at that very time their kingdom was driven away 
[from them] ? For with justice did God grant a recompense, . . . and 

26 Ant. xviii, 3. 3. 26 Schaff's Person of Christ, 201, and in Peregrinus, Lard, vii, 

279, 280. 27 Cited from Lactantius in Lard, vii, 476. 

28 Cels. ii, 45. 297^. vii, 53. ™Bab. Tal. Sanhedr. 43, a. & Annals, xv, 44. 



Passion, Death, and Burial of Jesus Christ. 225 

the Jews were brought to destruction, and expelled from their kingdom ; 
and [now] are driven away into every land. Socrates did not die be- 
cause of Plato ; nor Pythagoras because of the statue of Hera ; nor yet 
the wise King because of the new laws which he enacted." 32 

Dr. Heinrich Graetz, professor in the University of Breslau, 
Prussia, himself a Jew, and the recent author of a History of 
the Jews, says, touching the founding of Christianity : 

" How was it possible to discover what was the secret of this sect ? 
To bring that to light, it was necessary to tempt a traitor among his 
followers, and that traitor was found in Judas Iscariot, who, as it is re- 
lated, incited by avarice, delivered up to the judges the man whom he 
had honored as the Messiah. The Christian authorities state that Jesus 
was nailed on the cross at nine o'clock in the morning, and that he ex- 
pired at three o'clock in the afternoon. His last words were taken 
from a Psalm, and spoken in the Aramaic tongue: ' God, my God, why 
hast thou forsaken me ? ' The Roman soldiers placed in mockery the 
following inscription upon the cross: 'Jesus of Nazareth, King of the 
Jews.' The cross had been erected, and the body was probably buried 
outside the town, on the spot which was the graveyard of condemned 
criminals. It was called Golgotha, the place of skulls." 

' ' Such was the end of the Man who had devoted himself to the im- 
provement of the most neglected, miserable, and abandoned members 
of the people, and who perhaps fell a victim to a misunderstanding. How 
great was the woe caused by that one execution! How many deaths and 
sufferings of every description has it not caused among the children of Israel ! 
Millions of broken hearts and tragic fates have not atoned for his death ! He 
is the only mortal of whom one can say, without exaggeration, that his death 
was more effective than his life. Golgotha, the place of skulls, became to the 
civilized world a new Sinai." ^ 

y) After Events. Celsus once more witnesses to the preter- 
natural darkness and to the earthquake which gave emphasis 
to the crucifixion, and occurred between the sixth and the 
ninth hour while Christ was dying. He says : 

" You have discovered a becoming and credible termination to your 
drama in the voice from the cross, when he breathed his last, and in 
the earthquake and darkness." 34 He makes " a taunt also of the blood 
of Jesus which was shed upon the cross," saying, " "What is the nature 
of the ichor in the body of the crucified Jesus ? Is it such as flows in 
the bodies of the immortal gods ? " " It is not the ichor such as flows in 

®Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. VIII, p. 737; Schaff, Hist. Ch. Church, I, 171, 172, 
last ed. 

33 Hist, of Jews, Eng. ed., pp. 163, 165, 166. 34 Cels. ii, 55. 



226 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

the veins of the blessed gods." 35 Celsus adds: " You will not, I sup- 
pose, say of him that after failing to gain over those who were in this 
world, he went to Hades to gain over those who were there." 36 

Even the skeptical historian, Edward Gibbon, affirms the 
Scriptural account of the preternatural phenomenon when he 
says : 

" Under the reign of Tiberius the whole earth, or at least a cele- 
brated province of the Roman Empire, was involved in preternatural 
darkness for [the space of] three hours." 37 

In case of capital punishment it was the established custom 
of the Jews to cast out and leave exposed ignominiouslv the 
si70 incidents remams °f executed malefactors, unless friends 
of His Burial. f the criminal made request of the authorities 
to take possession of the dead body for burial. This rule was 
observed in the case of Jesus. Great pains were taken to 
know that the man executed was really dead before the 
body was delivered over to the custody of the friends. How 
carefully the Komans observed this requirement is narrated 
in the sacred text. When Joseph of Arimathea, who was 
a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin, but had not consented 
to the death of Jesus, went to Pilate and requested the 
possession of our Lord's body, it was not granted to him 
until the governor had ascertained that Jesus had indeed 
really died. This assurance was given, not through the 
friends of Christ, nor yet through the honored Sanhedrist Jo- 
seph, hut his own Roman centurion* who was the officer of the 
day, and in whose custody the body was kept. At the instance 
of the Jews, to hasten death, the soldiers approached and " brake 
the legs of the first and of the other who were crucified 
with him; but when they saw that he was dead already, 
they brake not his legs; but one of the soldiers with a 
spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood 



* Tacitus calls this officer, " exactor mortis.''' 1 

J® Cels. ii,36; i, 66; comp. John xix, 34. 36 j . u, 43; C omp. 1 Pet. iii, 19; lv, 6. 

« Decline and Fall of Rom. Empire, 1, 583, 584; comp. Matt, xxvii, 45; Luke xxiii, 44. 



Passion, Death, and Burial of Jesus Christ. 227 

and water." 38 In reference to the disposition of the body, 
Kabbi Frey says : 

" Here we behold another instance of the interposing providence of 
God to fulfill the Scripture. Had the common and natural course of 
things taken place, if no friend had obtained the body of Jesus, it would 
have been ignominiously cast among the executed malefactors. But if 
his body had been thrown there, the prediction could not have been 
fulfilled." 89 

The Toledoth Jeshu relates that Jesus was buried before the 
Jewish Sabbath began, which is in exact accordance with the 
statements of the Evangelists. That is, the burial « 171 Burial 
occurred on Friday evening, the day of the execu- of Jesus, 
tion, before the set of sun, the Jewish Sabbath being Saturday, 
reckoning from sunset of the day before. John is the only 
Evangelist who locates the place of his sepulcher. He says : 

" Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden ; and 
in the garden a new sepulcher wherein was never man yet laid ; there 
laid they Jesus, therefore, because of the Jews' preparation day ; for the 
sepulcher was nigh at hand." *° 

The prophet Isaiah had predicted, " His rest shall be glo- 
rious," 41 which accords with the Vulgate version; 42 a Scrip- 
ture, which Abrabanel says, " may be expounded of Messiah's 
honorable burial." ffl 

REVIEW OF THE TESTIMONIES. 

What is the state of the case as narrated by the Evangelist 
respecting the death of Christ as actually accomplished on the 
cross, and how has it been absolutely confirmed « 172 TheCase 
by Christ's adversaries ? This point is made un- stated, 
mistakably clear in the second Gospel. Mark, in his careful- 
ness to give details with all correctness, narrates very circum- 
stantially the several particulars which arose after the cruci- 

38 John xix, 31-37. ™ Messiahship of Jesus, p. 260. See Mishna Sanhed. 

c. 1, $$ 5, 6; Maimonides, Hilch. Sanhed. c. 14, $9. 

*° John xlx, 41, 42. « Isa. xi, 10. 

42 The Vulgate reads: "Erit sepulchrum ejus gloriosum "— His grave shall be 
glorious. The Rabbis refer this passage to the Messiah. 

43 R. Frey's Messiahship of Jesus, 261. 



228 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

fixion, preliminary to the burial of Christ's body. Incident- 
ally, but fortunately for us, he employed terms which are 
absolutely determinative of the case as to his death. When 
Joseph requested leave to bury the body, Pilate was amazed 
that Jesus was already dead, and sent his trusted officer, the 
Roman centurion, to ascertain the exact state of the case, and 
then return and report to himself personally. Upon having 
learned the fact the following significant sentence occurs in 
the narration : "And when he learned it of the centurion, he 
granted the corpse to Joseph" u 

About thirty circumstances in all connected with the cru- 
cifixion are recorded authentically in the Gospels, and are 
§ 173 The Re _ confirmed by adversaries. Celsus and the Talmud 
capitulation, mention the proffered vinegar and gall which 
Jesus refused on the cross ; but the Toledoth Jeshu affirms that 
he afterwards received and drank the vinegar alone. To 
make the assurance of Christ's death doubly sure, the soldier 
pierced his side with the spear, whence flowed forth blood. 
Hence Celsus draws special attention to this fact and the 
"ichor" the supposed blood of the gods. Josephus relates 
that Jesus was condemned to the cross by Pilate ; Hierocles, 
that he was " apprehended and crucified ;" Lucian, that Jesus 
" was crucified in Palestine ;" the Toledoth, that he was " cru- 
cified and died ;" the Talmud, that his death occurred " on 
the evening of the Passover ;" and the Toledoth confirms the 
Talmud. 

The Roman historian Tacitus, with marked completeness, 
epitomizes all the essential facts in his own historical method. 
He gives the name Christ to the person who was executed ; 
the fact, that he was put to death as a supposed criminal ; his 
place in history, the Founder of the Christian name ; his execu- 
tion, by the order of Pontius Pilate ; the office of the ruler, the 
procurator of the Romans ; the country which he ruled, the 

44 Mark xv, 45, Rev. Vers. The Greek is remarkably explicit, rb irrQfjut, the 
dead body, in contradistinction from rb <r£>/j.a, the body (living or dead). 



Passion, Death, and Burial of Jesus Christ. 229 

province of Judaea ; the time of Pilate's ruling, in the reign of 
Tiberius Caesar. The statements of the Evangelists affirming 
the death of Jesus are verified as authentic and historical be- 
yond recall by this one profane historian alone. The man who 
would deny it as a fact would not be benefited by any histor- 
ical investigation. Moreover, the credibility of Tacitus is thus 
declared by the "free-thinking" Gibbon, whose dislike of 
Christianity was as cordial as it was unjust. In a single para- 
graph descriptive of the persecutions of the primitive Chris- 
tians under the rule of the Emperor JSTero, Gibbon says : 

" The most skeptical criticism is obliged to respect the truth of this 
fact and the integrity of this celebrated passage of Tacitus. The former 
[its truth] is confirmed by the diligent Suetonius, who mentions the pun- 
ishment which Nero inflicted upon the Christians ; the latter [the integ- 
rity] may be proved by the consent of the most ancient manuscripts, 
by the inimitable character of Tacitus, and by his reputation, which 
guarded his text from interpolation/' etc. 46 

CHRISTIAN CONFIRMATIONS. 

The first four Pauline Epistles, which are accepted by all 
living skeptics as thoroughly authentic and credible, confirm 
the witness of Celsus in respect to the doctrine of _ , „ . _ .. 

r §174. Testi- 

Christ's death as a Redeemer. Paul's testimony mony of the 
must stand for the teachings of all the apostles 
on this doctrine. It is in effect that in the sufferings and 
death of Jesus he made atonement for mankind ; and that the 
atonement makes possible to all men the forgiveness of sins, 
and renders an endless salvation certain to all who believe on 
him to that end. It is to be noticed that the preternatural 
darkness witnessed by Celsus is amply confirmed by Christian 
Apologists. Paul teaches : 

" In due time Christ died for the ungodly. While we were yet sin- 
ners Christ died for us." 46 ''And he died for all. God was in Christ 
reconciling the world unto himself, not reckoning unto them their tres- 
passes. Him who knew no sin he made to be a sin [-offering] on our be- 
half." 47 " Our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins. Christ 
redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us." 48 

45 Decline and Fall of Rom. Emp., Milman's ed., Vol. 1, 602. 

48 Rom. v, 6, 8, 11. « 2 Cor. v, 15, 19, 21. 4 * Gal, i, 4 ; ill, 13. 



230 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

The teaching of the Apostolic Fathers, the pupils of the 
apostles, is to the same effect. Their teaching illustrates how 

§175. Testi- they were a P ostolicall y taught. 

mony of the a) Barnabas: "It was necessary for him to suffer on 

Apostolic tfie tree> Thou art taught concerning the cross and him 

that was crucified. If the Son of God . . . suffered that 

his wound might give us life, let us believe that the Son of God could 

not suffer except for our sakes." 49 

/3) Ignatius: " The Son of Mary . . . was truly persecuted under 
Pontius Pilate; was truly crucified and died in the sight of those in 
heaven, and those on earth, and those under the earth. 60 [He was] truly 
nailed up in the flesh for our sakes, under Pontius Pilate and Herod the 
tetrarch, . . . that he might be an ensign unto all ages. 51 Be ye fully 
persuaded concerning the birth and passion, and the resurrection which 
took place in the time of the governorship of Pontius Pilate." 52 

The witness of the Christian Apologists is of a little later 
date. 

§176. Testi- 
mony of a) Aristides: "The Christians reckon the beginning 
Christian f their religion from Jesus Christ, who is named the Son 

ApolOgiStS. Qf God Mogt High „ 53 

j8) Tertullian: "The Jews were so exasperated by his [Christ's] 
teachings by which the rulers and chiefs were convicted of the truth, 
chiefly because so many turned aside to him, that at last they brought 
him before Pontius Pilate, at that time governor of Syria, and by the 
violence of the outcries against him extorted a sentence giving him up 
to them to be crucified. . . . Nailed upon the cross, he exhibited 
many notable signs by which his death was distinguished from all others. 
. . . All these things Pilate did to Christ. . . . He sent word of him 
to the reigning Caesar who was at that time Tiberius. 54 In the same 
hour, too [of his crucifixion], the light of day was withdrawn, when the 
sun at the very time was in his meridian blaze. Those who were not 
aware that this had been predicted about Christ no doubt thought it an 
eclipse. You yourselves have the account of the world-portent still in 
your archives." 55 

y) Jerome (b. about 330 A. D.) : In his Commentary on 
Matthew 56 he remarks respecting the darkness which prevailed 
from the sixth to the ninth hour of Christ's crucifixion : 

"They who have written against the Gospels suspect that the disci- 
ples of Christ, in their account of our Lord's resurrection, have mistaken 
the darkness which was only an eclipse of the sun that happens at cer- 

« Barn. Epls. cc. 5, 12, 7, 8. » Epls. to Trails, c. 9. " Epis. to Smyrns. 1, 2. 
62 Epis. to Mags. c. 11. 63 Aris. Apology, p. 37. 5 * Tertull. Apol. c. 21. 

65 Tertull. Apol. c. 21. 66 Matt, xxvii, 45. 



Passion, Death, and Burial of Jesus Christ. 231 

tain seasons in the ordinary course of things ; whereas an eclipse of the 
sun can never happen but at the time of the new moon; and all the world 
knows that at the Passover it was full moon; and that there might be no 
pretense for saying that this darkness was owing to the shadow of the 
earth, or to an interposition of the moon between us and the sun, it is 
recorded to have continued for the space of three hours." 

About sixty distinct circumstances and doctrines have been 
cited in this chapter, related to the sufferings, death, and burial 
of Jesus Christ. These are the fundamental §177. conciu- 
facts on which rest all the teachings of the New sion * 

Testament. But for these as foundation, Christianity had 
never existed. Without them, Christianity would perish; 
with them, it can not be overthrown. They are facts substan- 
tiated as historical, in the first instance, by those of known 
hostility to this religion who lived in the first three Christian 
centuries. Their witness is confirmed by the concededly 
authentic Epistles of Paul, as well as by the apostles' succes- 
sors, the Apostolic Fathers and the Christian Apologists, who 
defended the faith before the rulers of their times. Thus the 
continuity of current history is preserved in this evidence. But 
few questions of like early antiquity admit of such a wealth of 
clear and conclusive proof as do these facts recorded in the 
four Gospels. Can the foundation of this religion be true, 
and the superstructure be shown to be false? The capital 
facts being proved, can the teachings of the New Testament 
resting thereupon be disproved? The facts and evidence 
adduced legitimate the following 

Inductions. 

1. That Jesus Christ did actually die on the cross is true as all 

the Gospels state. 

2. That this occurred in the rule of Pontius Pilate, and in the 

reign of the Emperor Tiberius. 

3. That the event took place at Jerusalem, in Judaea, in a 

country called Palestine. 



232 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

4. That the occasion taken for Christ's crucifixion, was at the 

Jewish Passover. 

5. That his death was a realized fact exactly at the hour of 

the evening sacrifice. 

6. That the apostolic teaching was, the death of Jesus was an 

atonement for mankind. 

7. That the evidence adduced proves the antiquity and authen- 

ticity of the New Testament. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE KESUKKECTION OF JESUS CHEIST. 

I. Incidents Eelated to His Resurrection. 

1. The Resurrection and its Witnesses. 

2. Movements of the Jewish Sanhedrists. 

3. Story of the Roman Guard Incredible. 

4. Attitude of Christ's Disciples. 

II. Evangelists' Narratives of the Resurrection. 
a) Their Individual Accounts as given. 
/S) Their several Christophanies Arranged, 
y) The Ten Reappearances of Christ. 
5) The Difficulties of the Narratives. 
e) The several Difficulties Resolved. 

III. Gospels Confirmed by the Enemies of Christianity. 

Celsus — Toledoth Jeshu — the Talmud. 

IV. Recorroborations by Friends of Christianiyy. 

a) Apostolic Fathers: Barnabas — Clement — Ignatius. 
/3) Christian Apologists : Aristides — Tertullian — Origen. 
y) Paul's Several Testimonies. 

V. Monumental Evidence of the Resurrection. 

a. The Christian Church. 

b. The Christian Sabbath. 

VI. Modern Theories respecting the Resurrection. 
i. The Theory that it was a Swoon. 
ii. The Theory of a Hallucination. 
iii. The Witness of Modern Skepticism. 

Dr. Keim — Dr. Ewald — Dr. Schenkel — Dr. Baur. 

Inductions. 
233 



Chapter X. 
THE KESUKKECTXON OF JESUS CHKIST. 

§ 178. Sources: Biographical Epitomes, and Literature. 

1. Clement of Rome (Epis. A. D. 95) was one of the most celebrated of 

the Apostolic Fathers. He was the pupil and companion of Paul, 
whom the apostle commends as one of those " fellow-laborers 
whose names are written in the Book of Life." (Phil, iv, 3.) Dr. 
Schaff regarded him as probably descended from the distinguished 
Flavian family, and hence related to the imperial household at 
Rome. He says: "The imperial household seems to have been 
the center of the Church at Rome from the time of Paul's impris- 
onment.' ' (Ch. Hist. II, 63£, n.) This is quite obvious from the 
apostle's own expressions: "My bonds in Christ are manifest in 
all the palace." " All the saints salute you, chiefly they that are 
of Csesar's household." (Phil, i, 13 ; iv, 22.) 

Clement was a man of noble character, of superior adminis- 
trative abilities, and of great spirituality. Bryennios believed 
that for nine years he was Bishop of Rome. (Schaff, Ch. Hist. II, 
638, n.) He died a natural death, about A. D. 100, in the third 
year of Trajan's reign. His epistle addressed to the Corinthians 
was written about 95 (Lightfoot), and it sought to compose an 
unhappy feud which had occurred in that Church occasioned by 
the illegal deposing of certain presbyters who had been rightfully 
made such by the apostles themselves. (Epis. xliv-xlvii.) The 
aggressive party had earlier been subject to discipline under Paul. 
(1 Cor. i, 12, 13.) Clement's epistle does not assume to have the 
authority of Divine inspiration, but is advisory in character. It 
consists of sixty-six chapters ; and if we except the epistle of Bar- 
nabas (70-79), this is "the oldest Christian writing after the 
apostles." It is said to have been conveyed to the Church at Cor- 
inth by one Claudius Ephebus, Valerius Biton, and one Fortunatus, 
who endeavored to undo the wrong, restore the right, and, after 
conciliation, returned to Rome with assurances of peace. 

2. Polycabp (69-155) was the " last witness of the Apostolic Age." He 

was the disciple of the Apostle John. He was held in the highest 
reverence by those who knew him best, especially because of his 
very spiritual character. Even his heretical adversaries are said to 

235 



236 Historical Evidence of the JSTew Testament. 

have coveted his gracious consideration, He was elevated to the 
episcopate about the year 104. Because of his previous relations 
with John, it is understood by many that our Lord's letter dictated 
in the Apocalypse referred to Poly carp when it was dedicated " To 
the Angel of the Church in Smyrna.' ' (Rev. ii, 8-10.) 

A letter had been sent by the Church at Philippi to the Bishop 
of Smyrna. The "epistle of Polycarp is his reply. It was written 
soon after the death of Ignatius, the Bishop of Antioch, Syria. It 
answered inquiries respecting that event which occurred at Rome, 
mentioning Zosimus and Rufus (c. 9), who are understood to have 
accompanied Ignatius on his way to the Capital, and were present 
at his martyrdom. This epistle contains fourteen chapters, in 
which is found invaluable testimony respecting the crucifixion and 
the resurrection and ascension of our Lord, as well as the identity 
of the doctrines as taught with those in the New Testament. 

3. Ferdinand Christian Baur (1792-1860), of Wiirtemberg, was elected 

Professor of Church History at Tubingen in 1826, where he 
founded his famous school of destructive criticism, and found a 
following by Strauss, Schwegler, and others. One of the most 
notable writings of history is his Christianity and the Church in the 
First Three Centuries (2 vols., London, 1878, 1879) ; also a treatise 
on Paul. He could see nothing in the history of the apostles to 
account for the strange power of Christianity, but the differences 
which he supposed to exist among the apostles in the controversy 
between Paul and Peter at Antioch. His hypothesis, however, 
has been thoroughly refuted by other writers of the destructive 
school. Baur employed the first four epistles of Paul (Romans, 
1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, and Galatians) as authentic and 
credible to assail Christianity. If these epistles are good for the 
attack, they are equally good for the defense. All these epistles are 
credited now by all the destructive critics. 

4. Heinrich August von Ewald, a famous Biblicist and a native of Got- 

tingen. He was chosen Professor of Philosophy at the University 
of Gottingen in 1831, and again Professor of Oriental Languages in 
the same institution in 1835. In 1838 he went to Tubingen as 
Professor of Theology. His chief writings noted here were his 
Hebrew Grammar, The Poetic Books of the Old Testament (4 vols.) ; 
A History of the People of Israel until the Advent of Christ (7 vols.) ; 
History of the Apostolic Age; and the Year-Book of Biblical Science. 
Dr. Ewald belonged to the more learned and conservative critics. 
He was born in 1802, and died in 1875. 

5. Theodore Keim (1825-1878) was a native of Wiirtemberg, a student 

in the University of Tubingen under the instruction of Baur in 
the study of Philosophy, Biblical Criticism, and Ecclesiastical 
History. He became tutor in the University of Bonn, also at 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 237 



Tubingen (1851-1855), and subsequently was chosen Professor of 
Theology in the University of Zurich. His chief works are the 
Reformation in Germany ; The Historical Christ (1866), a work 
which made him famous ; and a History of Jesus of Nazara (3 vols., 
1867-1872, Eng. ed. 6 vols., 1873). Dr. Keim was a moderate liber- 
alise very scholarly and very fair and candid. 

6. Matthew Arnold (born 1822) was educated at Rugby and Oxford; 

became Professor of Poetry in 1857. Among his prose writings 
were his Essays on Criticism (in 1865) ; St. Paul and Protestantism 
(in 1870) ; Literature and Dogma (1873) ; The Church and Religion 
(1877); Literature and Science (1883, 1884), a course of Lectures 
in the United States. In theology, Dr. Arnold was a so-called 
liberalist, 

7. Richard Whately (1787-1863) was an Anglican writer and prelate, 

born at London. He was educated at Oriel College, Oxford, 
where he graduated in 1812. He was the author of a work on 
Logic, and one on Rhetoric — works which won him much fame. He 
delivered a course of Bampton Lectures in 1822, on the Uses and 
Abuses of Party Feeling in Religion; and in 1819 he issued a re- 
markably ingenious work which was satirical in character on 
Skepticism, entitled Historical Doubts Relative to the Existence of 
Napoleon Bonaparte. His writings were quite numerous and very 
valuable, indicating keen insight and scholarly acuteness. He 
also added his Annotations to Paley's Evidences of Christianity, 
which also are valuable. 

8. W. Beyschlag, an orthodox writer of Germany, who, however, 

brought criticism upon him and his class of thinkers by his Essay 
written and published at Altenburg in 1864, in which he contended 
in Christology for two separate natures in Christ, amounting to 
dualism in his personal life, and denied Christ's pre-existence as 
a personality, and, by consequence, denying the Incarnation of 
Jesus Christ. 

§179. The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 

The history of the life of Christ on earth closes with a miracle as great 

as that of its inception. — Dr. Edersheim. 
Nothing is historically more certain than that Christ rose from the dead 

and appeared to his own [disciples 1, and that this their vision was 

the beginning of a new, higher faith, and of all their Christian 

labors. — Dr. Ewald. 
Nothing but the miracle of the resurrection could disperse the doubts 

which threatened to drive faith into the eternal night of death. 

For the faith of the disciples of Jesus became the most solid and 

the most irrefutable certainty. — F. C. Baur. 



238 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

The unhesitating denial of the resurrection, in spite of the serious diffi- 
culties which exist in conflict with the belief of so many among 
the laity, is the fruit of neither a scientific nor a religious con- 
science. We are not able to comprehend how the Christian 
Church, with all its clearness of mind, with all its earnestness of 
moral purpose, could have been founded as the result of overex- 
cited visions. — Dr. Keim. 

We feel how boundless is the caprice which would remove the glorious 
solution from the history of the life of Jesus, and transfer it 
henceforth to the history of the apostles and their self-deception. 
— Dr. Van Oosterzee. 

It is infinitely easier to admit that the Christian Church is the offspring 
of a miracle than to imagine it to be born of a lie. — Beyschlag. 

ARGUMENT. 

That same Jesus who was crucified, and was dead and buried in a 
sepulcher of stone, arose and reappeared in bodily form and life 
on the third day. He was seen alive by his disciples, with whom 
he continued in familiar intercourse for the space of forty days. 
To the understanding of both friends and foes his resurrection 
was at first a stumbling-block, and was rejected by them alike as 
untrue. Neither accepted it until the fact had demonstrated its 
reality to their personal senses and consciousness. Neither was 
prepared for such a miraculous event, which began at once and 
continues yet to revolutionize the faiths of the world. The 
enemies of Christianity have ever sought to deny this marvelous 
occurrence which they have never been able to refute — this 
imperishable fact and truth upon which the Christian religion 
reposes as its foundation. 

The story invented by the Jews to be circulated by the soldiery, that 
the body of Jesus was stolen by night, is found to be transparently 
false, as it is preposterously absurd. And so far from being 
grounded in the mental hallucination of the apostles, the rising 
of Jesus from the sepulcher of death was a surprise to mankind, 
as it was the glory of the Redeemer, and the source of exhaustless 
consolation and joy to the redeemed ; a fact whose power con- 
tinues to this day, and will continue until the end of time, to 
influence the thought and order the character of the best portion 
of mankind. There are two monuments of his resurrection, the 
Christian Church and the Christian Sabbath. 

1. Incidents related to his Resurrection. 

2. The True History of his Resurrection. 

3. Confirmatory Proof of his Resurrection. 

4. Monumental Evidence of his Resurrection. 

5. Modern Theories of his Resurrection. 






The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 239 

Lord Lyndhurst died in 1863, after having been Lord 
Chancellor of England for the fourth time. During his last 
illness, and near its end, a friend visited him, and 
found him occupying his mind with a pile of Lyndhurst 
infidel works, gleaning the strongest objections and Matthew 
adduced against the resurrection of Jesus Christ. 
This great judicial mind had been carefully investigating the 
evidence of this capital fact of Christianity, when, turning to 
his friend, he said: "Of evidence I may be allowed to be as 
competent a judge as most men, and it is my opinion that such 
evidence as might he adduced for the resurrection of Christ has 
never broken downP Dr. Matthew Arnold, a critic and a man 
not suspected of too much leaning toward orthodoxy, did not 
hesitate to say: "I have been used for many years to study 
the history of other times, and to examine and weigh the 
evidence of those who have written about them, and I know 
of no fact in the history of mankind which is proved by better 
or fuller evidence of every sort, to the mind of a fair inquirer, 
than the great sign that God has given us that Christ died 
and rose again from the dead." This subject has been an 
open challenge for honest investigation for nearly two thou- 
sand years. 

I. Significant Incidents of the Case Stated. 

No believer in Christ saw Jesus in the act of rising from 
the dead. No sacred writer affirms that the eyes of man 
beheld him in the glory of that supreme moment. „, „, • 

& J r §181. Resurrec- 

Exactly what they state is, that when his friends tion and 
on the third morning looked into the sepulcher 
to find the lifeless body of their Lord, to their surprise it had 
disappeared, and they found only an empty tomb ! However, 
this is far from saying that there were no witnesses of Christ's 
resurrection ; for with one united voice, in private and in pub- 
lic, before friends and before foes, in the presence of the mul- 
titude in the temple and before the Sanhedrin, the Jews' senate 
16 



240 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

of judicature, on all occasions and in all places, immediately 
after the wondrous occurrence, and ever afterwards, without 
explanation, without qualification, and without hesitation, the 
apostles claimed and proclaimed themselves as witnesses of 
the fact of Christ's resurrection from the dead. They dis- 
tinctly affirm the event, not upon the transient sight in seeing 
him rising out of the sepulcher, but upon that more enduring 
ground, his reappearance and continuance in closest personal 
relation with themselves for the space of forty days after he had 
risen. This is the sum of their testimony: 

"He showed himself alive after his passion, by many infallible 
proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things per- 
taining to the kingdom of God." 1 ''Him God raised up the third day 
and showed him openly . . . unto witnesses chosen before of God, 
even to us who did eat and drink with him after he rose from the dead." 2 
"This Jesus did God raise up, whereof we all are witnesses." 3 

If the eyes of man did indeed behold Jesus in his resurrec- 
tion thus attested, it was not his friends who saw him rise, but 
the Roman guard granted by Pilate at the Jews' 



. Move- 
ments of request, who were stationed as watchers over 

Adversaries. Christ?s lifeless body in the tomb . For some 

reason, on Friday evening the high priests, who were Saddu- 
cees, and the Pharisees who believed in the resurrection of 
the dead, became keenly apprehensive of possible occurrences, 
and were extremely careful concerning things which might 
happen. The tumultuous and exhaustive scenes of the cruci- 
fixion had closed, followed by the generous hush of the night; 
but the Jewish leaders became more thoughtful, reflective, 
and restless. For once the Pharisees and Sadducees make 
common cause, and go together to Pilate, saying, "Sir, we 
remember that that deceiver said while he was yet alive, 
After three days I will rise again. 4 Command therefore that 
the sepulcher be made sure until the third day, lest his dis- 
ciples come by night and steal him away, and they say unto 

lActs i, 3. 2 J6. x, 40, 41. 3Jb. ii, 82. * Matt, xxvii, 62-66. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 241 

the people, He is risen from the dead ; so the last error shall 
be worse than the first." Their request was reasonable and 
readily granted them, and every precaution was then taken 
under their own direction against possible imposture. " Pilate 
said unto them, Ye have a guard : go make it as sure as ye 
can. So they went and made the sepulcher sure, sealing the 
stone, the guard being with them." The great stone at the 
door is placed, the seal of the Roman ruler is set upon it, the 
molestation of which is death ; the watchers charged with the 
custody of the body are posted; and in the silence of the 
night, broken only by the tramp of the guard outside on duty, 
all are waiting and watching for the issues of the morning. 
But a surprise came upon them from an unexpected quarter 
with the early dawn. It was not the stealthy approach of the 
disciples as anticipated, whom weapons might easily subdue, 
but dumb Nature herself struggling convulsively to articulate 
and give emphasis to the hour. "There was a great earth- 
quake ; for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and 
came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it. His appear- 
ance was like lightning, and his raiment white as snow; and 
for fear of him, the keepers did shake and became as dead 
men." 

"Some of the guard" hasten into the city to tell the "chief 
priests all things that were come to pass." 5 What could have 
been the burden of that report, other than that 

_ . f § 183 - Tne Story 

Jesus had risen and forsaken that sepulcher? of the Roman 
Something must have happened or they would not 
have hastened to make a report at all. They would have had no 
report to make. It must have been something that interested 
the Jews, in whose special interest they had been guarding 
the tomb; for they go first to the high priests to report, 
instead of to Pilate, the Roman procurator, or to their own 
military officer. It was something which interested the 
soldiers; for the supreme matter with them was that they 

s Matt, xxviii, 4, 11-15. 



242 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

were charged with the keeping of the body in their own 
custody in the sepulcher. No report of "all things that had 
come to pass" could have been made leaving out the one 
capital fact that Jesus had risen from the dead. They after- 
wards confess that the body of Jesus was missing, however 
they would account for it. Something did occur, and it was 
that something to which the earthquake and the descending 
angel were but the background giving prominence to the 
picture. They go, therefore, to the high priests first, who 
were especially interested to know what had become of the 
body of Jesus, which had been placed under their care. It is 
evident and obvious that all prior arrangements had this one 
object in view, — to have the custody of the dead man in his 
sepulcher in their own power until the third day. Now, how 
could the guard tell all the occurrences of the morning unless 
they themselves had witnessed them ? There were no other 
parties to inform them of the facts. If, then, mortal eyes did 
see Jesus in the very act of rising, it was not his friends who 
were the first to witness and tell it, but the enemies of Jesus 
who attested it, while heaven and earth combined to demon- 
strate its certainty. 

Upon the arrival of the guard, and hearing their report of 

all that had occurred, the high priests assemble the Sanhe- 

drists to consider the unaccountable situation. 

§184. Proced- 
ure of the Nothing could be more natural than that the 

guard should tell their story to them in a simple 
and straightforward manner in the soldierly consciousness of 
duty faithfully performed. The Sanhedrists do not challenge 
any part of the account rendered by the soldiers. So far as 
appears, their report was thoroughly accepted and believed by 
these Jewish rulers. Indeed, the Jewish officials could not, if 
they would, deny that the body of Jesus was gone, and noth- 
ing left to them but the empty tomb. With a sense of terri- 
ble disaster do the Council apprehend the new situation, 
especially in view of their own past conduct in mocking the 
sufferings of Christ on the cross, and the failure of their 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 243 

precautions against all possible defeat. If the fact that Jesus 
had actually risen should get abroad, no one could predict 
what results might follow affecting the Jewish theocracy and 
the nation. 6 Two distinguished members of the Sanhedrin 
had begged and buried his body ; the chief priests and Phari- 
sees had urgently solicited the guard to hold the custody of 
his tomb and enforce its security. The Jews and Romans 
had combined to defeat the resurrection of Jesus, "lest his 
disciples . . . say unto the people, He is risen from the 
dead; so the last error shall be worse than the first." But 
now all these plans have come to naught. The elders counsel 
together, for something must be done. There is no possible 
explanation to give the people of what has occurred. In the 
consciousness of the Sanhedrists, whatever else be allowed to 
have happened, the resurrection of the man of Nazareth must 
he denied outright and at all hazards! If they will not tell 
the truth, they must fabricate the lie, and so escape the 
dilemma. No other course is open to them. If his rising 
from the dead must be denied, they must give out the report 
that his dead body was stolen away, as they at first antici- 
pated it might be. So the Jewish course is resolved upon. 
"They gave large money unto the soldiers, saying, Say ye, 
His disciples came by night and stole him away while we 
slept; and if this come to the governor's ears, we will per- 
suade him and rid you of care. So they took the money, and 
did as they were taught ; and this saying was spread abroad 
among the Jews, and continueth until this day." * 

* About a hundred years after the crucifixion, in his discussion with the Jew 
Trypho, Justin Martyr says: "Jesus expected you to repent of your wickedness 
[in crucifying him] at least after he rose from the dead, and to mourn as did the 
Ninevites in order that your nation and city might not be destroyed; yet you 
have not repented after you have learned that he rose from the dead; but [in- 
stead] . . . you sent men throughout all the world to proclaim that a godless 
and lawless heresy had sprung from one Jesus, a Galilean deceiver whom we cru- 
cified; but his disciples stole him away from the tomb where he was laid, un- 
fastened from the cross, and now deceiving men by asserting that he has risen 
from the dead and ascended to heaven." "When you knew that he had risen 
from the dead and ascended into heaven, as the prophets had foretold that he 
would, . . . you selected and sent out from Jerusalem chosen men through all 
the land to tell that the godless heresy of the Christians had sprung up, and to 
publish those things which all they who knew us not, speak against us. (Dialogue, 
cviii and xvii.) 6 Compare Acts v, 24, 28, and John xi, 48. 



244 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

But the explanation is simply incredible. It is incredible 
that the disciples would have stolen the dead body if they 
§185 The story could; and it is incredible that they could have 
incredible, stolen it if they would. For how could it pos- 
sibly advantage the disciples that they should violate the re- 
pose of the dead and rob the grave of its possession, since the 
body of Jesus had already received a royal sepulture in the 
new tomb of Joseph of Arimathea? And in the presence of 
the armed soldiers on guard, how could the disciples steal in 
upon the watch, break the great seal, the molestation of which 
was death, roll away the great stone successfully, and carry 
away the dead, without detection? If the guard were awake, 
they were stationed there expressly to prevent it; if they 
were asleep, how did they know that the disciples had stolen 
the body away? It is incredible that the disciples who, 
through fright, forsook Jesus at Gethsemane when he was ar- 
rested, leaving him in the hands of his enemies and to his 
fate, should approach the sepulcher, and, unlike the conduct 
of thieves, arrange and leave everything in order, putting the 
linens 7 in one place and the napkin of his head in another, in- 
stead of hurrying away with the body, as is alleged. It is 
incredible that the soldiers all, and all at once, had fallen 
asleep on duty, when sleeping on duty meant the forfeiture of 
their lives. And especially it is incredible, because it is su- 
premely preposterous, for Jews or Romans, or both together, 
to assert that Christ's disciples had come and stolen him away, 
and that they knew it by this circumstance: that they were 
themselves asleep while they witnessed it! And it is just as ab- 
surd as it is incredible that the Sanhedrists should have felt 
necessitated to bribe the soldiery to tell the truth respecting 
what they had seen. Unquestionably money in large sums 
has been used by corrupt men to suppress the truth and 
falsify ; but where in history is there a body of men who had 

7 TA606jua . . . £pTv\l<r<r<a, to en/old as linen grave-clothes ; comp. Luke 
xxiv, 12; xxiii, 53; and John xi, 44; xix, 40. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 245 

to be bought to affirm and put in circulation any statement 
unless they knew it to he false? Notably, those who are capable 
of bribing are capable of falsification. These corrupt officials 
who bribed Judas for treachery, afterwards suborned witnesses 
against Stephen; and in this instance they both bribe the 
soldiers and instigate them to perjury. 8 The whole procedure 
on the part of the Sanhedrists and soldiers carries on its face 
the ingrained evidence of an undisguised falsehood and fraud, 
as self-contradictory as it is self-criminating. What wonder 
that the story was relegated by the thoughtful to a deserved 
infamy, from the earliest Christian antiquity ! And are we 
asked to believe that this was the origin of Christianity! 
Truly, as Beyschlag has forcefully remarked, "It is easier to 
admit that the Christian Church is the offspring of a miracle 
than to imagine it to he horn of a lie /" 

The mental attitude of Christ's followers upon receiving 
the first information of his rising, was anything but favorable 
to a belief in his resurrection. Obviously the 

J §186. Attitude 

disciples did not anticipate the event, and its oc- of the 
currence took them completely by surprise. Re- 1SC1P es ' 
peatedly had Jesus predicted and emphasized the fact before 
his crucifixion, in order that his followers might be prepared 
for the awful issue involved in the tragedy of redemption, and 
be upborne by the hope of his rising while he slept the sleep of 
death ; but as often did they fail utterly in the great compre- 
hension. " For as yet they knew not the Scriptures, that he 
must rise again from the dead." 9 In absolute disappointment 
and despair they buried in his sepulcher all their anticipations 
of his kingdom and of himself as the coming ruler of Israel. 
Their sorrow was as simple as it was sincere and pathetic. It 
is with inimitable simplicity that the Evangelists relate how 
Mary Magdalene, having seen the Lord on the morning of the 
resurrection, "went and told them that she had been with 



8 See Matt, xxvi, 15; xxvii, 3-10; and Acts vi, 11. 
6 John xx, 9; Luke xxlv, 27, 45. 



246 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

him;" but they only "mourned and wept, and when they 
heard that he was alive and had been seen of her, they believed 
[her] not." 10 Then, after he had been seen of the other 
women, they all went together and "told these things unto 
the apostles;" but "their words seemed to them as idle tales, 
and they believed them not! 11 It is not wonderful, then, that 
when Peter visited his empty tomb with John, he " departed 
to his home, wondering at that which was come to pass." 12 
The two disciples of the Seventy who walked and talked with 
Jesus on the way to Emmaus, when rehearsing to him the in- 
cidents of his own crucifixion, added yet this : 

" Yea, and certain of our women made us astonished who were 
early at the sepulcher, . . . who said that he was alive." "Then 
opened he their understanding that they might understand the Scrip- 
tures." "In the breaking of bread their eyes were opened, and they 
knew him; and he vanished out of their sight." 13 "And they rose up 
the same hour and returned to Jerusalem and found the eleven gath- 
ered together, and them that were with them, saying, The Lord is risen 
indeed, and hath appeared unto Simon. And they told what things 
were done in the way, and how he was known of them in the breaking of 
bread. And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of 
them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. But they were terrified 
and affrighted, and supposed they had seen a spirit." 14 

These disciples then told Thomas that they had seen the 
Lord; but he rejected their testimony, refusing absolutely to 
believe in the stupendous occurrence, demanding both ocular 
and tangible demonstration to the senses before he would be- 
lieve. One week afterward the apostles were again assembled 
together, when suddenly Jesus " stood in the midst of them," 
and turning to Thomas, in the very language of his challenge 
of their faith, Jesus said: "Thomas, reach hither thy finger, 
and see my hands ; and reach hither thy hand and put it into 
my side, and be not faithless but believing." And Thomas in 
response exclaimed, " My Lord and my God ! " 15 

These facts are fatal to any theory which ascribes the resur- 
rection of Jesus to a mere preoccupancy of belief or anticipation 

10 Mark xvi, 10, 11. n Luke xxiv, 10, 11. 12 lb. xxiv, 12. 

i* lb. xxiv, 22, 23, 45, 46, 31, 35. " lb. xxiv, 33-37. 15 John xx, 24-28. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 247 

of mind on the part of the disciples ; for so far from expecting 
the event, they all in common absolutely rejected the testi- 
mony of others when they first affirmed that they had again 
seen him alive. Something revolutionized their conviction, for 
their sorrow was turned into indescribable joy r , 16 and in the face 
of all dangers they began at once to publish outright that very 
truth which they had previously rejected. They lived and died 
in this faith j and no man living has ever been willing to live 
and die for a lie, he knowing it to be such. 

II. The Narrations of Christ's Resurrection. 

A visit was made to the sepulcher by Mary Magdalene and 
the other G-alilean women on Saturday night, which was " the 
end of the [Jewish] Sabbath." 17 "And the 

L J . §187. The Even- 

WOmen also who came with him from Galilee ingandtne 

followed after, and beheld the sepulcher, and 
how his body was laid." 18 Three visits were made to the sep- 
ulcher on the morning of "the first day of the week:" 
(a) By Mary and the other women from Galilee, who seem 
not to have been informed of the special arrangements effected 
between the chief Jews and Pilate relating to the posted 
guard, and the sealed stone, and so brought sweet spices to 
embalm the body of Jesus. 19 (b) After Mary had fled from 
the tomb in haste to report the empty sepulcher to Peter and 
John, these two disciples ran together to the sepulcher to 
learn about the body which had disappeared. 20 (c) Mary 
Magdalene followed Peter and John, and returned to the tomb 
of Jesus. 21 The case was this : 

1. Mary Magdalene, accompanied by the Galilean women, 22 
went to the tomb together " at the early dawn," * on the first 

1 6 Matt, xxviii, 8; Luke xxiv, 41. 

17 '0^ 5£ (raP(3&T(av, "at the close of the Sabbaths;" i.e., Saturday at sunset. Matt, 
xxviii, 1. "The end of the Sabbath was at sunset the night before." (Alford.) 

18 Luke xxiii, 55; xxiv, 1; Matt, xxviii, 1; Mark xvi, 1. 

"Comp. Matt, xxviii, 1; Mark xvi, 1, 2; Luke xxiii, 55; John xx, 1. 

20 John xx, 3, 4. 21 Ib. xx, 2-4, 11. 

■2 Mark xvi, 1, 2; Luke xxiii, 55; xxiv, 1, 10. 23 Luke xxiv, 1, Rev. Version. 



248 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

day of the week. At the instant that Mary discovered the 
body was gone, she fled in dismay and distress to inform 
Peter and John of these facts. 

" She runneth and cometh to Simon Peter and the other disciple, 
whom Jesus loved, and saith unto them, They have taken away the 
Lord out of the sepulcher, and we know not where they have laid 
him !" 24 

2. Thereupon both Peter and John ran together to the 
tomb, leaving Mary to follow them more leisurely. John ar- 
rives first and looks into the sepulcher ; Peter follows closely 
after and enters into the tomb. 

"So they ran both together, and the other disciple did outrun 
Peter and came first to the sepulcher, and stooping down saw the linen 
clothes lying, yet went he not in. Then came Simon Peter following 
him, and went into the sepulcher, and seeth the linen clothes lie, and 
the napkin that was about his head." John "saw and believed;" 
Peter " departed wondering in himself at that which had come to pass." 
"Then the disciples went away again to their own home." 25 

3. During the Magdalene's absence from the tomb to tell 
these two apostles of the body that was missing, an angel ap- 
pears to the other women who remained at the sepulcher, and 
informed them that Jesus had risen. The angel sends a mes- 
sage in haste by them to the disciples that they should meet 
Jesus in Galilee as he had foretold them. On their way with 
this message, Jesus met the women. 

" They departed from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to 
bring the disciples word. And as they went to tell his disciples, behold, 
Jesus met them saying, All hail ! And they came and held him by the 
feet and worshiped him. Then said Jesus unto them, Be not afraid ; go 
and tell my brethren that they go into Galilee, and there shall they see 
me." "And go quickly and tell his disciples he is risen from the 
dead." 26 

Meantime, as the other women were about leaving the 
tomb in haste, Mary returned alone, following Peter and John, 
standing outside the sepulcher weeping. She looks into the 
tomb and sees two angels. 

« John xx, 2. 26JT&. xx, 3-8, 10; Luke xxlv, 12. 20 Matt, xxviii, 7-10. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 249 



"And as she wept she stooped down and looked into the sepulcher, 
and seeth two angels sitting the one at the head, and the other at the 
feet where the body of Jesus had lain. . . . She saith unto them: 
Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they 
have laid him. And when she had thus said, she turned herself back and 
saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. . . . She, sup- 
posing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou hast borne 
him hence tell me where thou hast laid him, and 1 will take him away. 
Jesus saith unto her, Maey! She turneth herself, and saith unto him, 
Rabboni,* which is to say, Master. Mary Magdalene came and told 
the disciples that she had seen the Lord, and that he had spoken 
these things unto her." 27 



a) The Evangelists' Accounts Individually. 

1. Matthew mentions only two appearances of Christ after his rising : 
(1) To the women when on the way bearing the angel's 

message to the apostles, on the morning of the resurrec- Number of 
tion; 28 and (2) To the eleven disciples on a mountain in Appearances. 
Galilee. 29 

2. Mark mentions three appearances: (1) To Mary Magdalene alone 
at the sepulcher ; * (2) To Cleopas and another disciple on the way to 
and at Emmaus; 31 (3) To the ten disciples at Jerusalem on that night, 
Thomas being absent. 32 

3. Luke mentions four appearances: (1) To the two of the seventy 
disciples at Emmaus ; " (2) To Simon Peter alone — the fact but not the 
circumstances named; 34 (3) To the ten apostles on the first night at 
Jerusalem ; ^ (4) To the eleven disciples who received their commis- 
sion, where Jesus ascended into heaven. 36 

4. John mentions four appearances: (1) To Mary Magdalene alone 
as already described; 37 (2) To the ten apostles at Jerusalem, Thomas 
being absent j 38 (3) To the eleven together one week later, Thomas be- 
ing present j 39 (4) To the seven at the Sea of Tiberias in Galilee. 40 



* There were three titles of distinction given to the Jewish teachers, repre- 
senting three different degrees: viz., 72a6(3"l)=" Master;" Rabbi (\3*l)="My 
Master;" and Rabboni 03131, Greek, "Pappopl, or 'Papfiovvl, but sometimes Rab- 
&an*pl) = "My great Master." It is not certain whether the first was in use in 
Christ's time. 

« John xx, 11-16, 18. «s Matt, xxviii, 8-10. 2» 76. xxviii, 10, 16. so Mark xvi, 9. 

» Mark xvi, 12, 13; Luke xxiv, 13-18, 30, 31. 32 Mark xvi, 14. 

as Luke xxiv, 13, 81. *Ib. xxiv, 34; 1 Cor. xv, 5. 

«5 lb. xxiv, 33, 36-48. 86 j&. X xiv, 47, 49, 50-53. 37 John xx, 11-17 

8»76. xx, 19-24. 8975. xx , 26-29. « lb. xxi, 1-14. 



250 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

To these instances cited by the evangelists severally may 
be added those of the Apostle Paul: 

5. Paul mentions six appearances ; (1) To Cephas, otherwise called 
Simon Peter; 41 (2) To James the brother of our Lord, apart from the 
apostles; (3) To those disciples formerly designated " the Twelve;" (4) 
To the five hundred at once in the mountains of Galilee; (5) To "all 
the apostles" together, probably at Jerusalem ; (6) "And last of all" to 
Paul also as " one born out of due time." a 

p) The Several Christophanies Arranged. 
The actual number of Christ's reappearances after his res- 
urrection, and the order of their occurrence, are unknown. 
„ A The sacred writers do not profess to have re- 

§189. Arrange- r 

ment of the corded all his reappearances, or their regularity. 

Christophanies. -^^ -, ,-, 7 , » -, . . . 

We have, consequently, no data lor determimng 
these questions with certainty; but allowing time sufficient 
for the apostles to travel to Galilee where Jesus had promised 
to meet them, and then return to Jerusalem, they were 
probably in full fellowship with him during the forty days 
intervening his resurrection and his ascension: "being seen of 
them, forty days" ffl If seen of them forty days, he must have 
been seen of them forty times at least. 

7) The Ten Eeappearances op Christ. 
First Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 
"He appeared first to Mary Magdalene" 44 when she came 
the second time to the sepulcher on the morning of the first 
day of the week, and stood weeping outside the tomb. Jesus 
saith unto her, Mary ! She responded, Kabboni ! "Mary Mag- 
dalene cometh and telleth the disciples, I have seen the Lord, 
and how he had said these things unto her." ^ 

Second Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 
The women from Galilee bring spices to the sepulcher, 
finding the stone rolled away, " enter into the tomb and found 
not the body of the Lord Jesus." ® 

« Luke xxiv, 34; 1 Cor. xv, 5. «1 Cor. xv, 6-8. « Acts i, 8. 

« Mark xvi, 9. 45 John xx, 11-18. 46 Luke xxiv, 1-3. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 251 

But they saw " two men in dazzling apparel" and "were afraid." 
11 They said to the women, Why seek ye the living among the dead? He 
is not here but risen. Remember how he spake unto you when he was 
yet in Galilee, saying that the Son of man must be delivered up into 
the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again ; 
and they remembered his words." 47 "Then the angel saith unto them, 
Go tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before them into Galilee ; 
there shall ye see him, as he said unto you. And they went out and 
fled from the tomb." 48 "And they departed quickly from the tomb 
with fear and great joy, and ran to bring the disciples word." 49 "For 
trembling and astonishment had come upon them ; and they said noth- 
ing to any one, for they were afraid." 50 "Now they were Mary Mag- 
dalene, and Joanna, and Mary the mother of James, and the other 
women [from Galilee] with them, and told these things unto the apos- 
tles." 61 "And behold Jesus met them saying, All hail ! And they came 
and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. Then saith Jesus unto 
them, Fear not ; go tell my brethren that they depart into Galilee, and 
there shall they see me." 62 

Third Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 

The third appearance of the risen Jesus was to Simon Peter. 
The sacred writer gives no circumstantial account of it. But 
the angel sent a message to him specially by the women ; and 
the fact that Peter did see Jesus alive again is duly recorded 
as having occurred on the day of the resurrection, and told by 
the eleven and those with them to the two disciples of the 
Seventy upon their return to Jerusalem from Emmaus, and 
also by Paul. 

The angel "saith unto them [the women], ... Go your way; 
tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee; 
there shall ye see him, as he said unto you." 63 "And they rose up that 
same hour and returned [from Emmaus] to Jerusalem, and found the 
eleven gathered together, and them that were with them saying, 
The Lord is risen indeed and hath appeared to Simon." 64 "He rose 
from the dead on the third day, according to the Scriptures, . . . 
and was seen of Cephas 65 [Peter], then of the twelve."* 

*It should be noticed that "the Twelve," without Judas, particularizes not 
the specific number, but that particular class of disciples, as that class, in distinc- 
tion from "the Seventy;" i. e., meaning those disciples who had formerly con- 
stituted and passed under the appellation of "the Twelve." Comp. Matt, x, 2-5, 
and Luke x, 1, 17; xxiv, 33. 

« Luke xxiv, 4-9. « Mark xvi, 7, 8. 49 Matt, xxviii, 8. 

so Mark xvi, 8. si Luke xxiv, 1-10. sa Matt, xxviii, 9, 10. 

63 Mark xiv, 28 ; xvi, 7. 54 Luke xxiv, 33, 34 ; 1 Cor. xv, 5. 

551 Cor. xv, 4, 5. 



252 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Fourth Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 
On the clay that Jesus rose, two of the seventy disciples 
went to the village called Emmaus, which was "threescore 
furlongs" distant from Jerusalem, or about seven and a half 
miles. One of the two is named Cleopas, and "another dis- 
ciple" tradition mentions as being Luke, as no one but one of 
the party could have furnished so sharp and circumstantial an 
account as that which he narrates of what happened in the 
course of its movements. 56 Jesus, unrecognized, joins their 
company, and they rehearse the sad particulars of his own 
crucifixion, and the morning rumor that Jesus had risen from 
the dead, and they say: 

"Certain women of our company amazed us, having been early at 
the tomb, and when they found not his body, they came saying that they 
had seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. And certain of 
them that were with us went to the tomb and found it even as the 
women had said; but him they saw not." "And it came to pass when 
he had sat down with them he took bread and blessed, and, breaking it, 
he gave it to them ; and their eyes were opened, and they knew him ; 
and he vanished out of their sight." 67 

Fifth Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 
On the evening of the same day these two disciples, having 
returned to Jerusalem, found the ten apostles together, 
Thomas being absent ; and they reported unto the apostles the 
occurrences of the day on their journey, and were told that 
Peter also had seen the risen Jesus.* They were informed : 

"The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared unto Simon. And 
they told what things were done in the way, and how he was known of 
them in the breaking of bread." 58 So " they went and told it unto the 
residue, neither believed they them." 59 "And as they thus spake Jesus 

* The first individual to whom the risen Christ appeared was Mary Magda- 
lene (Mark xvi, 9); the first of "the twelve disciples " was Simon Peter (Luke 
xxiv, 33, 34 ; 1 Cor. xv, 5) ; the first of the ten disciples collectively was on the first night 
at Jerusalem, Thomas being absent (Luke xxiv, 33, 34; John xx, 19, 20, 24) ; the first 
time to the seventy disciples was to the two journeying to Emmaus (Luke xxiv, 
13, 18). His last appearance was at the ascension (Luke xxiv, 50, 51; Mark xvi, 19). 
Besides, he was seen thrice afterwards in heaven: once by John (Rev. i, 1-8, 18); 
once by Stephen (Acts vii, 56, 59); and once by Paul (Acts ix, 1-9; xxii, xxvi; 
1 Cor. xv, 8; Gal. i, 11,12). 

66 Luke xxiv, 13-35. 67 Luke xxiv, 22-24, 30, 81 ; comp. Mark xvi, 12, 13. 

68 Luke xxiv, 34, 35; 1 Cor. xv, 5. 5 » Mark xvi, 12, 13. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 253 

himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto 
you. But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they 
had seen a spirit. And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled, 
and why do thoughts ["troubles"] arise in your hearts? Behold my 
hands and my feet, that it is I myself ; handle me and see ; for a spirit 
hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have. And when he had thus 
spoken unto them, he showed unto them his hands and his feet," 60 
"and his side. Then were the disciples glad when they saw the Lord." 61 

This was the same time when Jesus "appeared unto the 
eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their 
unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not 
them who had seen him after he was risen." ® After this they 
said to Thomas, "We have seen the Lord!" 63 But Thomas 
refused their testimony. 64 

Sixth Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 

It was just one week later, according to the Jewish 
method of reckoning which was inclusive of the two appear- 
ances, when Jesus appeared to the disciples again. Turning 
to that disciple, the Lord employs the very language which 
he had employed as his demand before he would believe 
Christ risen when he challenged the testimony of his fellow- 
disciples. Jesus said : 

11 Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands ; and reach hither 
thy hand and put into my side, and be not faithless but believing. 
Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God ! Jesus saith 
unto him, Because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed ; blessed are 
they they that have not seen, and yet have believed." 65 

Seventh Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 
Just before his passion the Lord foretold to his disciples 
how that very night they would be scattered like sheep with- 
out a shepherd, adding, " But after I am raised up, I will go 
before you into Galilee." m The angel at the tomb reminded 
them of this statement of the Master : 

' ' He goeth before you into Galilee ; there shall ye see him as he 
said unto you." 67 "And they remembered his words." 68 " Then the 
eleven disciples went away into Galilee, into a mountain where Jesus 

60 Luke xxiv, 36-40. « John xx, 20. 62 Mark xvi, 14. 

63 John xx, 24, 25. 64 John xx, 24, 25. 65 John xx, 26-29. 

66 Matt, xxvi, 32. 67 Mark xvi, 7. 68 Luke xxiv, 6, 8. 



254 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

had appointed them ; and when they saw him, they worshiped him." 69 
"After these things Jesus showed himself again to the disciples at the 
sea of Tiberias. There were together Simon Peter, and Thomas called 
Didymus, and Nathanaelof Cana in Galilee, and the two sons of Zebedee 
[James and John], and two other of his disciples." 70 

At the suggestion of Peter, the disciples had gone a-fishing, 
their old avocation ; and early in the morning Jesus appeared 
again to them on the beach, and directed them where to cast 
in the net to be successful. John was the first to exclaim : 
"It is the Lord." They all go ashore. They were all invited 
to come and partake of the morning meal which Jesus had 
prepared for them. 

"This is now the third time that Jesus showed himself to his dis- 
ciples [collectively] after that he was risen from the dead." 71 

Eighth Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 
The only record we have in the New Testament of the 
eighth appearance of Jesus after his resurrection is that 
made by the Apostle Paul : " After that he was seen of above 
five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part re- 
main until now ; but some have fallen asleep." ra 

Ninth Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 
To " James, the Lord's brother," Jesus appeared alive after 
his death ; but nothing is known from the record beyond the 
fact. Probably he appeared to James when he was alone, as 
he seems to have done to Peter. This James apparently was 
not one of the original twelve disciples, and is not named in 
the first list of the apostles. 73 It is possible that in the early 
part of Christ's ministry he was one of those " friends " who 
are mentioned as suspicious that Jesus was " beside himself " 74 
just when he was most intently engaging in his Messianic 
work. Some decisive occasion must have occurred which 
wrought in James the conviction that Jesus was the Christ of 
God ; for subsequently to the resurrection we find James iden- 

«9 Matt, xxviii, 16, 17. ™ John xxi, 1, 2. n lb. xxi, 14. 

fa l Cor. xv, 6. 73 Matt, x, 2-5. ™ Mark ill, 20, 21. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 255 

tilled with the other apostles by common recognition. Euse- 
bius, the first Church historian whose work has come down to 
us, mentions the pre-eminence which he attained among the 
early Christians in that he was known as " James the Just" w 
who became first Bishop of Jerusalem, and presided over the 
Council of the Church in that city, and also wrote the epistle 
which bears that name. Josephus relates that the Sanhedrin 
condemned the "brother of Jesus who was called Christ, 
whose name was James, and some others, companions," 76 to be 
stoned, and Eusebius particularizes how the sentence was exe- 
cuted. Paul mentions a special visit which he made to Jeru- 
salem early in his own ministry, in which he spent fifteen days 
with Peter, and says, " But other of the apostles saw I none, 
save James, the Lord's brother;" that " James and Cephas and 
John were reputed to be pillars " "" of the Church, all of whom 
gave him the right hand in recognition of his legitimate Chris- 
tian apostleship. Paul, accordingly, is careful to note James 
in his relation to Christ's resurrection, and says: "After that 
he was seen of James, then of all the apostles." 78 

Tenth Reappearance of Jesus Christ. 
Presumably, all the apostles were present together to re^ 
ceive from Jesus their great commission of the apostolate, 
after which the Lord led them out to the Mount of the Ascen- 
sion. Of Christ's appearance on this occasion Luke distinctly 
affirms : 

" Concerning all that Jesus began, both to do and to teach, until the 
day in which he was received up, after that he had given commandment 
through the Holy Spirit unto the apostles whom he had chosen, to whom 
he showed himself alive after his passion by many [infallible] proofs, ap- 
pearing unto them by the space of forty days, and speaking the things 
concerning the kingdom of God ; and being assembled together with 
them, he charged that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait 
for the promise of the Father. . . . And when he had spoken these 
things, while they beheld he was taken up, and a cloud received him out 
of their sight." 79 

KEccl. Hist. B 11, cc. 1,23; iv, c. 5; vii, c. 19. n Ant. xx, c. 9, $ 1. 

n Gal. i, 18, 19; 11, 9; Acts xv, 13, et seq. 78 1 cor. xv, 7. 

" Acts i, 1-4, 9-11; comp. Luke xxiv, 50-52; Mark xvi, 19. 
17 



256 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Thus far goes the record of the New Testament touching 
the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Obviously these 
ten appearances alive after his death are not exhaustive in that 
"he was seen of them for forty days." Nor perhaps is this 
the strict order of his reappearances. All that is claimed for 
this scheme is that it seems to be the correct one according to 
the scanty data given in these Scriptures, as the sacred writers 
were not careful to note the number or order of his appear- 
ances. To know them thus certainly would gratify our curi- 
osity, but would subserve no important interest of the truth. 
The fact itself \ however, is evidently secure. 

5) The Difficulties of the Narratives. 

A revelation of the resurrection of a dead Redeemer, given 
by angels from heaven, is something altogether unique in itself, 
§ 190. The Many of the supposed discrepancies in the 
unique story, accounts of the Evangelists are due to our own 
misapprehension of the facts related. A close and careful fol- 
lowing of the several texts of these writers taken in their 
natural sense, without preconceptions or forced and arbitrary 
suppositions, will leave the account with but little or no em- 
barrassment to the understanding. 

That there are seeming discrepancies in the several accounts 
of the Evangelists touching the resurrection of Jesus is at least 
§ i9i. Apparent conclusive of the fact that there was certainly no 
Discrepancies, collusion between the writers to fabricate the 
statement given. Those shrewd enough to devise a fictitious 
scheme on such a subject would obviously be entirely too 
clever to embarrass it with discrepant details. For how could 
designing men leave their writings in such bad form as appar- 
ently to contradict each other on the cardinal point of their 
fictitious Gospel ? Besides, the contemporaries of these writers 
and their successors, for whose special advantage they wrote, 
had no difficulty at all in understanding the whole story of the 
Gospel just as it is told, with all its omissions and gaps, not- 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 257 

withstanding the want of order in the chronology of the facts 
stated ; and they have transmitted to us these writings with- 
out any attempt to explain or correct any misstatements 
whatever. The accounts of the resurrection, therefore, come 
to us, not only uncontradicted in this respect, but bearing upon 
their face the sanction and sanctity of the highest Christian 
antiquity. Notwithstanding that each writer wrote independ- 
ently of the others, and at a remote distance ; that each one 
had his own specific object in view in writing a Gospel ; that 
every one neglected to state full details, so that occasionally 
the data are somewhat scant ; yet all this does not vitiate the 
validity of their statement in the least, or militate against the 
truth of the account narrated. 

Especially in the case of the resurrection of Jesus there is a 
profound underlying unity in the story itself as given in the 
several Gospels; a unity which would not be 2 The 

ignored in a court of trial where different wit- unity of the 
nesses testify, each one communicating substan- 
tial truth, with circumstantial variety of statement. Of course, 
documentary evidence is the silent testimony of the witnesses 
who have long been dead, and we are without the opportuni- 
ties to fill the gaps in the narratives given. But this is the 
necessary characteristic of all documentary evidence of long 
standing. It is none the less historical on that account. 
Nevertheless, if we have in any given case insufficient evi- 
dence to form a proper judgment, our ignorance for the want 
of information justifies us in forming no judgment against the 
case ; much less are we entitled to attribute our own mistakes 
to the authors, and then reject the account altogether. Gries- 
bach in his Prolusion says : 

"It is to be observed that the Evangelists seem to have dwelt 
on those particular points in which they were personally concerned. 
This appears to furnish a very simple key to their apparent discrep- 
ancies. John who received his first intelligence from Mary Magdalene 
makes her the principal person in his narrative ; while Matthew, who, 
with the rest of the disciples, derived his information from the other 



258 Historical Evidence of the ]Sew Testament. 

women, gives their relation [of the resurrection], and omits the appear- 
ance of Jesus to Magdalene. St. Mark gives a few additional minute 
particulars. But the narrative of St. Luke is altogether more vague and 
general. He blends together, as a later historian studious of compres- 
sion, the two separate transactions ; he ascribes to the women collect- 
ively that communication of the intelligence to the assembled body of 
the apostles which appears to have been made separately to distinct par- 
ties, and, disregarding the order of time, he after that reverts to the 
visit of St. Peter to the sepulcher." 80 

It is proposed now to examine the several narratives to as- 
certain whether they are really discrepant, or whether they 
convey substantial agreement and truth. All the main diffi- 
culties touching the resurrection of Jesus may be reduced to 
five in number, namely : 

a) Differences supposed respecting the angels seen at Christ's tomb. 
/3) Differences as to Mary's report before or after seeing the angels. 
7) Differences in time when the women visited the sepulcher together. 
5) Differences in the conduct of the women when leaving Christ's tomb, 
e) Differences as to the places where Jesus appeared to his disciples. 

e) These Dipfeeences Reconciled. 
A. Matthew and Mark, upon the one hand, affirm that 
there was one angel at the tomb of Jesus, but Luke and John 
mention two angels. The Evangelists enumerate the angels as 
one and two, as they appeared to different persons, at different 
times, outside or inside the empty sepulcher. The exercise of 
a judicious judgment is therefore called for respecting these 
circumstances in their proper relations, when the case will be 
found to be relieved of all discrepancy, without the least resort 
to arbitrary assumptions."* 

* As illustrative of the fact that from insufficient data seeming discrepancies 
do often arise, Ebrard in his Gospel History, pp. 59, 60, relates the following occur- 
rences which happened in his own experience: 

" A messenger named N. was sent from Zurich to Pfaffikon on the occasion 
of an outbreak [of a mob] in the latter place. Accordingly, Ebrard was informed 
by a trustworthy person that N. was sent later in the evening with a letter to 
Pfaffikon. Another told him that N. was sent in the evening to Pfaffikon, but 
that, after going a short distance, he returned with the report that the alarm-bell 
had already rung at Pfaffikon. A third [party] related that two messengers had 
been sent on horseback to Pfaffikon; and a fourth [party] said that N. had sent 
two men on horseback to Pfaffikon. These seeming discrepancies vanished when 
Ebrard afterward learned from N. himself that he had indeed been sent, but met 
on the way two messengers from Pfaffikon, who reported the outbreak of the riot; 
that he turned back with them to Zurich, where he immediately procured horses 
for them, and sent them back to quiet the people of Pfaffikon. Thus we see that, 
once in possession of the thread of the narrative, it is an easy matter to arrange 
upon seemingly refractory and incompatible circumstances." 

soMilman's History of Christianity, Vol. I, 350. note. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 259 

Matthew describes one angel as at first seen by the women 
when they were approaching the sepulcher. The angel is 
represented as then being outside the tomb : 

"For the angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and 
rolled back the stone and sat upon it." " And the angel . . . said 
unto the women, . . . Come see the place where the Lord lay." 81 

Upon the other hand, Mark says that — 

" Very early in the morning, on the first day of the week, they [the 
women] came to the sepulcher at the rising of the sun, . . . and 
entering into the sepulcher, they saw a young man sitting on the right 
side." 82 

The first Gospel mentions an angel outside the tomb, con- 
spicuously seated upon the great stone which had been rolled 
away from the entrance; and the second Gospel represents 
another angel inside the tomb, "sitting on the right side" of 
the sepulcher. Matthew describes the first as "the angel of 
the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled away 
the stone, and sat upon it;" Mark describes the one inside the 
sepulcher as "a young man" "clothed in a long white gar- 
ment." But now Luke describes the angels as in the form of 
"two men" in shining garments within the deserted tomb, 
and, when seen, were standing beside the women: 

"And they [the women] entered in, and found not the body of the 
Lord Jesus ; and . . . behold, two men stood by them in shining gar- 
ments." 83 John also speaks of " two angels in white, sitting the one at 
the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had 
lain." 84 

Now, it is to be observed that no Evangelist, more than 
other witnesses in court, undertakes to include all the details 
of any event in his own narration. It is natural that each 
witness should testify first of that which impressed him most. 
This clears the way for the consideration of the seeming con- 
flict between the first two and the last two Gospels, respecting 
(a) the number of the angels at the sepulcher, whether one or 
two ; and (b) the posture of the angels when seen, whether 
standing or sitting. 

81 Matt, xxviii, 2, 5, 6. 82 Mark xiv, 1,2, 5. 83 Luke xxiv, 2-4. 84johnxx,ll,12. 



260 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

a) First of all we are indebted to John for discriminating 
the different procedures in the company of women. He draws 
the distinction between what Mary Magdalene did and saw 
apart from what the other women of Galilee did and saw. 85 
They all came from the city to the sepulcher together, bring- 
ing sweet spices ; and all alike were surprised to find the great 
stone rolled away, and that the body of Jesus was missing. 
But at this point the road of the women parted. Mary, with- 
out having seen an angel, ran in great haste and reported to 
Peter and John the opened grave and missing body ; but the 
other women remaining saw "the angel of the Lord descended 
from heaven," who had "rolled back the stone from the door, 
and sat upon it." 86 "And entering into the sepulcher they 
saw [another] young man sitting on the right side, clothed in 
a long white garment." 87 Thus there were two angels pres- 
ent ; one that sat on the great stone outside the sepulcher, and 
the other that sat "on the right side" within the sepulcher. 
Luke, however, does not particularize in the same manner; 
but he mentions that the women from Galilee " entered into 
[the sepulcher] and found not the body of the Lord Jesus," 
but that "two men stood by them in shining garments." 88 
John omits altogether what the Synoptists say about the 
other women, and narrates what the Synoptists neglected to 
relate about Mary Magdalene ; that she, having reported the 
empty tomb to Peter and John, returned to the sepulcher, 
and, standing outside, " stooped down and looked into the sep- 
ulcher, and seeth two angels in white, sitting the one at the 
head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had 
lain." 89 Thus the difficulty as to the number of angels has 
vanished. 

/?) The posture of the angels as seen at the sepulcher is the 
remaining difficulty of the case. Matthew represents an angel 
as having a countenance "like lightning, and his raiment 

»Matt. xxvlii, 1; Mark xvi, 1-3; Luke xxiii, 55; xxiv, 1, 2; John xx, 1. 

86 Matt, xxviii, 2, 3, 5. 8 ? Mark xvi, 5. 88 Luke xxiv, 3, 4. 89 John xx, 11, 12. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 261 

white as snow," seated outside the tomb on a great stone. 
Mark represents an angel as sitting inside the sepulcher, 
" clothed in a long white garment." Luke represents that 
"two men stood" by the women inside the tomb "in shining 
garments." John represents Mary Magdalene alone, who 
" seeth two angels in white, sitting, the one at the head and 
the other at the feet where the body of Jesus had lain." Ob- 
viously we can not and do not have to think of angels as in- 
animates, fixed and immovable in their positions as so many 
statues, since the Scriptures characterize them as an order of 
great activities. Now, if these angels were represented as be- 
ing seen by the same persons, all at once in the same moment, 
we clearly should have discrepant statements from our Evan- 
gelists. But just as clearly the angels were not so seen, are 
not so described in point of fact. Some time was requisite 
for the angel outside the sepulcher to deliver and impress his 
message upon the women to be borne to the apostles; and 
more time was consumed when, on the angel's invitation, the 
women entered into the sepulcher to inspect the situation. 
All this allows ample time for change in the attitude of the 
angels who were directing the women, quite as much as a 
change in place on the part of the women themselves. The 
angel outside the tomb did not say to the women, "Go" as 
sending them within, but, "Come," as leading the way, "see 
the place where the Lord lay." w The rest is as easy as it is 
natural. Later, when the women were within the sepulcher, 
they saw the angels standing beside them; but Mary Magda- 
lene, returning alone to the place, saw them composedly 
sitting at the head and foot of the sepulcher. Conformably 
with these facts, a discrepancy is impossible. 

B. The supposed difference between Luke and John as to 
whether Mary Magdalene reported to the apostles generally 
before or after she had seen the angels. Luke names Mary 
Magdalene, Joanna, and Mary the mother of James, as 

so Matt, xxvlii, 6. 



262 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

receiving a message from the angels for the apostles, and 
that they "returned from the sepulcher and told all these 
things unto the eleven and all the rest ;" 91 while John repre- 
sents the Magdalene as having left the other women at the 
tomb, and running to report the missing body of Jesus to 
Peter and John. Luke omits stating this circumstance about 
Mary, but John particularizes it. Peter and John having 
heard Mary's report, they run together ahead, and Mary fol- 
lows, returning to the tomb, when, for the first time, and as 
the first one, she sees the risen Lord. Arriving, — 

" Mary stood without the sepulcher weeping, and as she wept she 
stooped down and looked into the sepulcher, and seeth two angels sit- 
ting . . . where the body of Jesus had lain." "And they say unto 
her, Woman, why weepest thou ? She saith unto them, Because they 
have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him. 
When she had thus said she turned herself back, and beholdeth Jesus 
standing, and knew not that it was Jesus" until he called her name, 
" Mary." Then, but not till then, "Mary Magdalene cometh and 
telleth the disciples, I have seen the Lord, and how he had said these 
things unto her." 92 

It is thus seen that Mary Magdalene made two different 
reports, on two different occasions, about two different things : 
the first time to Peter and John about the disturbed tomb 
before she had seen either the angels or Jesus ; and also after 
having seen them, she reported again that fact unto "the 
eleven and to all the rest." So the supposed discrepancy 
disappears. 

C. The difference in the point of time specified by the 
Evangelists when the women visited the Lord's sepulcher. 
John states that "on the first day of the week, cometh Mary 
Magdalene, early while it was yet dark, unto the to?nb" m 
Luke says that "on the first day of the week at early dawn 
they came unto the tomb." 94 Mark affirms that "very early 
on the first day of the weeJc they come to the tomb when the sun 
was risen" 95 Matthew states that "as it began to dawn 

»i Luke xxiv, 9, 10. MJohn xx, 1, 11-18. **Ib. xx, 1. 

w Luke xxlv, 1. 96 Mark xvi, 1, 2. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 263 

toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and 
the other Mary to see the sepulcher." m The material point of 
difference in these statements is that Matthew, Luke, and 
John substantially agree in saying that the women went to 
the Lord's sepulcher "as it began to dawn," "at the early 
dawn," "early while it was yet dark;" while Mark states that 
"they come to the tomb when the sun was risen." Evidently 
the three Evangelists who mention the dawn, contemplate the 
time of starting, while Mark contemplates the moment of 
arrival; for he expressly says, "They come to the tomb when the 
sun was risen." Some time must be allowed for so early a 
gathering of the women within the city while it was dark, 
and for the social interchange of thoughts and feelings under 
the intensely interesting occasion of the crucifixion just 
passed, and for the distribution of the spices which they 
themselves were to bear to the tomb, as well as for the 
journey itself, even if there were no short detention at the 
opening of the gate of the city at so early an hour. The 
lapse of time thus between "early dawn" and the risen sun 
would indeed be brief in that locality. This is but hypothesis, 
but it is an hypothesis which explains, and one to which the 
case is entitled. 97 

D. The difference in the descriptions of the feelings and 
conduct of the women returning from the sepulcher. 

Mark says : " They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling 
and astonishment had come upon them ; and they said nothing to any 
one, for they were afraid." 98 But Matthew says: "They departed 
quickly from the sepulcher with fear and great joy, and did run to 
bring the disciples word. ... As they went to tell his disciples, 
behold, Jesus met them, saying, All hail ! And they came and took 
hold of his feet, and worshiped him." 99 

The discrepant passages here, as supposed, are those which 
represent the women as being at once filled with terror as due 
the angels, and yet filled with "great joy;" also that they 

96 Matt, xxviii, 1. 9T See Starkie on the Law of Evidence, §8,— (j3), in this work. 
es Mark xvi, 8. M Matt, xxviii, 8, 9. 



264 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

"said nothing to any one, for they were afraid," yet "came 
and took hold of his feet and worshiped him," after Jesus 
had hailed them on their way. If we divide the journey of 
the women, from the sepulcher to the disciples, into two 
sections, there is nothing whatever incompatible in these 
representations. For such in fact was the case. First, they 
fled the tomb and the angels in "trembling and astonishment," 
and "said nothing to any one," until they met Jesus, who 
hailed them. Their complete recognition of him both by 
sight and by his voice, revolutionized their feelings and 
conduct. Fright gave place to pleasure; "great joy" took the 
place of "trembling and astonishment." Having become 
composed in his presence, he charged them with a special 
message, together with their own witness to the disciples of 
his resurrection ; and from that moment they were filled with 
" great joy, and did run to bring his disciples word." Thus, 
without the least discrepancy, the women's conduct was as 
natural as it was real. 

E. Finally, the differences between the accounts of 
Matthew and Luke as to the place where Jesus appeared 
to his disciples after he had risen. It is claimed that 
Matthew 100 represents that he manifested himself in Galilee, 
but Luke 101 at or near Jerusalem where the sepulcher was. 

In this objection the supposition is, that each Evangelist 
meant his own account to be regarded as complete in itself, 
and exclusive of the accounts of the other Evangelists. But 
this is clearly a mistake, and not according to the record of 
the case. For while each writer in his own memorabilia 
mentions that which occurs to him first and impresses him 
most, no Evangelist claims to give all the details about any 
occurrence, much less all the reappearances of the risen 
Savior. Now, it is evident that for some to relate those 
instances in which Jesus manifested himself in the neigh- 
borhood of his nativity, and others those which occurred in 

100 Matt, xxviii, 16. i 01 Luke xxiv, 13-48. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 265 

Galilee, the case, in its nature, is not at all a discrepancy, but 
that of a supplementary narration in which discrepancy is 
impossible. This objection is based upon only a part of the 
written record, as we shall see. 

Matthew relates that when the several women together 
in their fright fled from the tomb at Jerusalem, they met 
Jesus on the way. Now, this Evangelist records that Jesus 
himself foretold before his death, "After I am raised up, I 
will go before you into G-alilee." 102 Mark employs the 
identical language. 103 Matthew relates that at the sepulcher 
the angel said, "Tell his disciples that he is risen from the 
dead ; and lo, he goeth before you into Galilee ; there shall ye 
see him;" a circumstance which is stated more fully by Mark: 
"But go, tell his disciples and Peter, that he goeth before you 
into Galilee; there shall ye see him as he said unto you" m 
Accordingly, Matthew continues that, "the eleven disciples 
went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had 
appointed them; and when they saw him, they worshiped 
him." 105 Mark adds that, "When Jesus was risen early on 
the first day of the week, he appeared first unto Mary 
Magdalene;" also to the two disciples, "as they walked on 
their way into the country" to Emmaus; also to "the eleven 
themselves as they sat at meat [at Jerusalem], and he 
upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, 
because they believed not them which had seen him after he 
was risen." 106 Luke is occupied in his Gospel with statements 
of reappearances in and near Jerusalem; 107 but in his Book of 
Acts, he records this : " To whom he also showed himself alive 
after his passion by many [infallible] proofs, appearing unto 
them by the space of forty days." 108 He also records Paul 
approvingly as saying, " God raised him from the dead, and 
he was seen for many days of them that came up with him 
from Galilee to Jerusalem, who are now witnesses unto the 

102 Matt, xxvi, 32. i° 8 Mark xiv, 28. 104 Matt, xxviii, 7 ; Mark xvi, 7. 

105 Matt, xxviii, 16, 17. m Mark xvi, 12, 14. 

107 Luke xxiv, 10, 13-31, 36-40, 48, 50-52. i°8 Acts i, 3; see also xiii, 30, 31. 265 



266 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

people." So Luke also approvingly records Peter's declara- 
tion : " Him God raised up [on] the third day and gave him to 
be made manifest, not to all the people, but unto witnesses 
that were chosen before of God even to us who did eat and 
drink with him after he rose from the dead." 109 So also Paul 
himself, in mentioning a number of appearances of Jesus 
about Jerusalem, adds this also : " Then he appeared to above 
five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part 
remain until now." 110 Then John relates the details of Mary 
Magdalene seeing Jesus alive again, his repeated appearances 
to the disciples at Jerusalem, and also to his disciples at the 
seaside in Galilee. "This is now the third time that Jesus 
was manifested to his disciples [collectively] after that he was 
risen from the dead." 111 It is thus evident that from the 
record, on the testimony of all the sacred writers, Jesus was 
seen after his resurrection, loth in Judasa and Galilee, and no 
discrepancy appears. 

III. Confirmations by Enemies of Christianity. 

The special value of this testimony consists in the fact 

that as early as the middle of the second century when 

Celsus in literature assailed Christianity, he 

§193. Testi- J ' 

monyof verifies the verdict of Christendom, and dreads 
the conviction of the heathen world respecting 
the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. His energetic opposi- 
tion to the belief admits the prior and current historical 
claim of Christ's rising. For while he sometimes denies for 
himself that event, he admits that something certainly did 
occur which suddenly and powerfully affected both friends 
and foes of the new religion. That something was rapidly 
and deeply moving whole communities toward Christianity 
with a conviction that was as permanent as it was revolu- 
tionary in character religiously. It required explanation; 

io9 Acts x, 40, 41. «oi Cor. xv, 4-6; comp. Matt, xxviii, 16, 17; Mark xiv, 28. 
ui John xx, 14, 17, 19-22, 24-26; xxl, 1, 2-14. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 267 

but an explanation Celsus was never able to give ; so he 
weakly resorts to ridicule in the place of reasoning. It will, 
however, be specially noted that he never in any instance 
ascribes Christ's resurrection to a mythical origin, or to some 
vague legend as having a modicum of truth with a large part 
of fiction. Upon the contrary, he repeatedly reminds his 
Christian readers, and accentuates the fact, that for his infor- 
mation on Christian beliefs he relies exclusively on the sacred 
books of the Christians which he had in his possession — books 
which he himself affirms were written by Christ's disciples. 
Accordingly, Celsus accepts the Gospels as those writings 
relied upon by Christians in distinction from all other writings 
which were apocryphal which arose in the middle of the 
second century. He says: 

" By what, then, were you induced [to become Christians]? Was it 
because he foretold that after his death he would rise again ?" 112 " But 
this is the question, Whether any one who was really dead ever rose 
again with a veritable body?" 113 "He rose after his death, and exhibited 
the marks of his punishment, and showed how his hands had been pierced by 
nails;" and ''while alive, he was no assistance to himself, but that 
when he was dead, he rose again and showed the marks of his punishment, 
and how his hands were pierced with nails." 114 

Origen, replying to Celsus, quotes him as saying : 

"We ridicule those who worship Jupiter because his tomb is pointed 
out in the island of Crete ; and yet we worship him who rose from the 
tomb;" 115 "He assails us who acknowledge that our Jesus had been 
buried indeed, but who maintain that he has been raised from the 
tomb ; a statement which the Cretans have not yet made regarding 
Jupiter." 116 

The evidential value of Celsus's testimony is to be found 
directly in the disturbing reason which induced the people to 
become Christians, but which he absolutely fails to answer as 
his own question. He admits that Jesus was dead as not to 
be questioned; and he seems to cite with approval the Chris- 
tian belief when he says, "He rose after his death and ex- 

»2 Origen contra Celsum, ii, 54. ™>Ib. ii, 57. ™Ib. ii, 59; ii, 55. 
»5 lb. iii, 43, top airbrovTaQov. ™lb. iii, 43. 



268 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

hibited the marks of his punishment, and showed how his 
hands had been pierced with nails," affirming that from the 
beginning the Christians did "worship him who rose from 
the tomb." This is the assertion of the capital fact which 
is its own explanation. If Jesus had not risen from the 
dead as he himself had foretold, he would never have been 
worshiped by mankind, nor would Christianity ever have 
obtained a foothold among the nations. It is precisely that 
fact that has given the Christian religion such power over 
men. That alone absolutely answers Celsus's questions: not 
that Jesus foretold his own resurrection, but that, having 
foretold it, it became a real and undeniable fact to those who 
saw him after that he was risen. Nothing else can account 
for the origin of Christianity ; and nothing else is required for 
the sufficient explanation. 

As exhibiting how the Jews dreaded the circulation of the 

report that Jesus whom they had crucified, had risen, 117 and 

§194. The Tea- to what extremes they had recourse in order to 

Toiedoth" av °id an( ^ evade the powerful influence of the 

jeshu. f ac t ? it may be well to insert the testimony of 
this rabbinical work on this subject. It says: 

" After the death of Jesus, his body was dragged ignominiously 
through the streets of Jerusalem ; and when distant disciples heard the 
report of their Master's death and resurrection, they hastened to send 
a deputation to the city to investigate the facts ; and upon their arrival 
the Jewish rulers showed them the [pretended] Master's corpse, after 
which the deputation retired and returned home, reporting that he was 
risen from the dead!" 118 

If this story is not absolutely a fiction throughout, it is 
barely possible that the Jews sought to impose upon the 
deputation by showing them the dead body of some man as a 
proof that Jesus was not indeed risen and alive again ; but the 
deputation at once detecting the attempted cheat, and having 

»» Matt, xxvii, 64; comp. Acts iv, 14-17, and v, 28. 

"8 Comp. note at end of $ 183, and Dr. Whately's Annotation on Paley's 
Evidences, Part 11, c. 8, p. 302, Amer. ed. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 269 

the true account confirmed in Jerusalem, they returned and 
reported the case as it really was to their people. 

Rabbi Moses Haddarshan, alluding to Messiah as referred 
to by the prophet Hosea, says : "After two days . 

he [Messiah] will revive us ; he will revive us in mony of the 
the days of the consolation to come." " The 
Messiah . . . shall die and rise again; and the dead shall 
he raised." 119 

It was the remarkable saying of Rabbi Judah Hakkodesh, 
"After three days the soul of the Messiah shall return to its 
body, and he shall go out of that [sepulcher of] stone in which 
he shall be buried." m 

In his testimony of Jesus, Josephus affirms that "He ap- 
peared to them alive again on the third day, 

55 196. T©Sti- 

as the divine prophets had foretold these and mony of 
ten thousand other wonderful things concerning 
him." 1 ' 1 

IY. Reconfirmations by Friends of Christianity. 

The witness of the immediate disciples and successors of 
the apostles is the connecting link in the history of this 
fundamental fact and doctrine of the Christian 

e i Qi7 Tosti- 

faith. The testimony of the Apostolic Fathers m0 ny of the 
serves not only to prove the anterior origin of i ^ 3 +? ;olic 
the faith as claimed, but also serves to prove 
the identity of that fact and faith with that now embraced 
and maintained in the Christian Church. 

1. Barnabas (A. D. 70-79): " Having brought about the resurrection 
he will himself exercise judgment." "Wherefore also we keep the 
eighth day for rejoicing, in which also Jesus rose from the dead." 122 

2. Clement of Rome (A. D. 95): "How the Master continually 
showeth unto us the resurrection. . . . Wherefore he made the 
Lord Jesus Christ the firstfruits when he raised him from the dead. 
Day and night, dearly beloved, show unto us the resurrection." 123 

119 On Gen. xxii, 4, Ber. Rab. and Targum, see Schottgen, Lectiones Rabbinicce, 
i, ii, pp. 557, 556, 572; cf. Matt, xxvii, 51-53. 

,20 Cited by Dr. Adam Clarke, Commentary on Matt, xxviii, 7, last ed. 
121 Josephus, Antiquities, B. 18, c. 3, $3. See Excursus A, of this work. 
^ Barn. Epistle, cc. 5, 15. 123 Clem. Epis. c. 24. 



270 Historical Evidence of the JSTew Testament. 



3. Ignatius (A. D. 107) : " Ignatius . . . rejoiceth in the passion 
of our Lord, and in his resurrection without wavering/' 124 "Jesus 
Christ who was of the race of David, who was the son of Mary, . . . 
persecuted under Pontius Pilate, was truly crucified and died in the 
sight of those in heaven, and those on earth, and those under the earth ; 
who moreover was truly raised from the dead, his Heavenly Father having 
raised him, who in like fashion will raise us also who believe in him." 125 
" My chart is Jesus Christ, . . . his death and his resurrection, and 
faith through him." " The Gospel hath a singular pre-eminence in the 
advent of the Savior, even our Lord Jesus Christ, and his passion and 
resurrection.' 5 m 

4. Polycarp (A. D. 155) : " Paul himself and the rest of the apostles 
. . . loved . . . Him who died for our sakes, and was raised by 
God for us." " Our Lord Jesus Christ, who endured to face even death 
for our sins, whom God raised, having loosed the pangs of Hades." "And 
may He grant unto you a lot and portion among the saints . . . who 
shall believe on our Lord and God Jesus Christ, and his Father that raised 
him from the dead." 127 

The earliest defenders of Christianity, before the local or the 

imperial government, gave expression to that which completes 

the proof that the Church was founded upon the 

monyofttie imperishable fact of Christ's resurrection from 

christian the dead. They constantly affirmed and tena- 

Apologists. _ ^ d 

ciously maintained "the faith once delivered to 
the saints." Their witness gives unity and continuity to the 
historical belief in the resurrection. No historian is supposed 
to have witnessed the events which he records; but wisely 
searches for just such evidence as is furnished by the Chris- 
tian Apologists on this subject. Their testimony may be taken 
in chronological order. 

1. Aristides (A. D. 123-126): "He was pierced by the Jews, and he 
died and was buried ; and they say that after three days he rose." 128 

2. Tertullian (A. D. 200): "Then when his body was taken down 
from the cross and placed in a sepulcher, the Jews in their eager watch- 
fulness surrounded it with a large military guard, lest, as he had pre- 
dicted his resurrection from the dead on the third day, his disciples 
might remove by stealth his body, and deceive even the incredulous. 
But lo! on the third day there was a shock of earthquake, and the seal 
which sealed [the great stone of] the sepulcher [was broken, and the 



124 Ignat. Introd. Epis. to PhiVa. i* Epis. to Trail's, c. 9. 

™Epis. to PhiVa, cc. 8, 9. 12 " Pply. Epistle, cc, 9. 1, 12. 128 Aris. Apology. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 271 

stone] was rolled away, and the guard fled off in terror without a single 
disciple near ; the grave was found empty of all but the clothes of the 
buried One." ^ 9 

3. Origen (A. D. 248) : "For who is ignorant of the statement that 
Jesus was born of a virgin, and that he was crucified, and that his resur- 
rection is an article of faith among [the] many." "And yet the mystery of 
the resurrection, not being understood, is made a subject of ridicule 
among unbelievers." 130 

Paul's witness on the resurrection of Jesus is invaluable on 
two special accounts : because of his prior hostility to Chris- 
tianity, and because that now no living skeptic 

* § 199. T©Stl- 

denies the authenticity and credibility of Paul's mony of the 
first four Epistles. The fiercest adversary became postle PauL 
the greatest advocate of the Christian religion. What wrought 
such revolution in the conviction of Saul of Tarsus ? He alone 
can tell the story, and no human being was ever willing to die 
for a lie, he knowing it to be such. When upon a mission of per- 
secution, "yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against 
the disciples of the Lord," he was smitten to the earth by 
an unseen power ; and from the dust he looked up and talked 
with the risen and ascended Christ in heaven. 131 Becoming 
converted in his faith, he remained a changed man in his life. 
His genius and learning, his culture and spirituality, thence- 
forth gave him a power over men never realized except by 
and from the "Man of Nazareth." No apostle, nor all the 
apostles together, labored so successfully for the development 
of the Christian doctrine as he. His personal work and influ- 
ence, so far from having diminished, have extended down the 
centuries, and are realized more than ever among the great 
and greatest nations of the earth, and are felt most in the fore- 
most civilizations which his teachings have created. Dr. Philip 
Schaff observes : 

" The late Dr. Keim [says] : ' The whole character of Paul, his sharp 
understanding, which was not weakened by his enthusiasm ; the careful, 
cautious, measured, simple form of statement; above all, the favorable 
total impression of his narrative, and the mighty echo of it in the unanimous^ 

mTertull. Apol. c. 21. 180 Origen contra Celsum, i, c. 7. 131 Acts, ix, xxii, xxvl. 
18 



272 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

uncontradicted faith of primitive Christendom, must not be overlooked.' Dr. 
Baur, the master-spirit of skeptical criticism, and founder of the Tu- 
bingen School, felt constrained, shortly before his death, . . . tc 
say, that in ' the sudden transformation of Paul from the most violent 
adversary of Christianity into its most determined herald/ he could see 
'nothing short of a miracle.' 'This miracle appears all the greater when we 
remember that, in the revulsion of his consciousness, he broke through the 
barriers of Judaism, and rose out of its particularism into the universalism 
of Christianity.' " 132 

In Paul's ministry at Athens he "preached unto them Jesus 
and the resurrection." ..." Wherefore he hath given assur- 
ance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead." m 
In the apostle's imprisonment at Csesarea-on-the-Sea, Festus, 
the noble procurator, explained to King Agrippa II why 
Paul was a prisoner in his custody, saying that the Jews had 
brought accusations "against him of their own superstition, 
and of one Jesus whom Paul affirmed to be alive." m 

In his Letters, Paul taught the same great fact and doc- 
trine of Christ's resurrection. Dedicating his Epistle to the 
Romans to this imperishable principle, he writes with great 
power : 

"Concerning his Son, who was born of the seed of David, according 
to the flesh, who was declared to be the Son of God with power, accord- 
ing to the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead, even Jesus 
Christ our Lord. . . . Knowing that Christ, being raised from the dead, 
dieth no more." " If thou wilt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, 
and wilt believe in thy heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou 
shalt be saved." " Unto whom it shall be reckoned who believe on him 
that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered for our 
offenses, and was raised for our justification." u But if the Spirit of him 
that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ 
from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies, by his Spirit that dwelleth 
in you." 

In his Epistle to the Galatians, Paul speaks of himself in 
respect to his apostolate as being "an apostle, not of men, 
neither by man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father, who 
raised him from the dead." 135 

132 Hist. Christ. Church, Vol. I, p. 815. 138 Acts xvii, 18, 81. 134 Acts xxv, 14, 19. 
135 Rom. i. 3, 4; iv, 23-25; vi, 8-10; vlll, 11; x, 9; comp. 1 Thess. iv, 13-17; Acts 
xxiv, 14, etc. 135 Gal. 1,1. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 273 

In his Epistle to the Corinthians, Paul iterates and accent- 
uates the fact of the doctrine of Christ's resurrection with 
considerable enlargement. He says : 

"I delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also received, how 
that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures ; and that he 
was buried, and that he rose again the third day, according to the Scrip- 
tures ; and that he was seen of Cephas, then of the Twelve ; after that 
he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater 
part remain unto this day. . . . After that he was seen of James, 
then of all the apostles ; and last of all was he seen of me also." 136 

Such was the teaching of the Apostle Paul in indoctrinat- 
ing the several Churches on the fundamental truths of Chris- 
tianity. 

Y. Monumental Evidence of His Resurrection. 
As the sacrament of the Lord's Supper has 

rr §200. Monu- 

ever been the solemn Memorial of Chrises death, mentsof the 
so there now exist two Momtments of his resur- esurr( 
rection. These are respectively designated The Christian 
Church and The Christian Sabbath. 

a) The existence of the Church of Jesus Christ is in itself 
an enduring monument of his resurrection. It must be so in the 
very nature of the case. Clearly, if there had been no resur- 
rection, there could be no Church founded upon it. But the 
Church does exist, and has existed in unbroken continuity from 
the times of the apostles until now. It has ever been standing 
before the Ages, a visible institution, living an historical life 
through all these Christian centuries since. It began to be at 
a definite date; it has continued to be, despite the oppositions 
which have confronted it and the distresses and cruelties im- 
posed upon it from Jewish and Roman persecutions. It lives 
to-day, a great Society abroad in the world, identified with the 
foremost nations of the earth, extending its benign influence 
to all pagan lands, and numbering in its organization hundreds 
of millions of the best peoples among mankind. 

KHCor. xv, 3-8. 



274 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

There was a brief period intervening the crucifixion and 
the organization of Christianity into a Church, which should 
not be overlooked. It was a time conspicuous for its wrecked 
hopes, its demoralized faith, and its outcry of despair and 
anguish, on the part of the broken-hearted apostles. In the 
death of the crucified Christ everything was lost to them, as 
they saw it. Every source of hope was extinguished. It was 
the death of all their Messianic conceptions of Christ's king- 
dom and reign. In the morning of the third day, some first 
messengers came hurriedly to tell them that Jesus was alive 
again, that he had been seen, and that he had risen from his 
tomb. But the apostles could not heed their word. To them it 
seemed that their report was a most improbable vagary, which 
they must have imagined. It was rejected in absolute negation. 
As previously, they only mourned and wept, and their words 
seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not. 
Unto some of them at least Jesus soon appeared, "and up- 
braided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, be- 
cause they believed not them which had seen him after he 
was risen." Meantime, some of them had abandoned the 
cause, and returned to their old occupation — to their nets and 
fishing-boats in the sea of Galilee. Now we are come upon 
their crucial moments. "When the third day was opening, a 
stupendous event occurred suddenly, which took the apostles 
by surprise. Its effect was to counteract their feelings of 
utter despair, to revolutionize all their prior convictions of the 
Messianic situation, and to inspire them every one with a new 
faith and a marvelous courage. There was but the one occur- 
rence, but that wrought a complete revolution and conversion of 
the apostles. It teas the power of a new fact / it was the resur- 
rection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Nothing less could have 
given them the new moral uplift. Brought now into a better 
understanding of his Messianic kingship as being not mon- 
archal, but spiritual, their faith began to be reconstructed in- 
telligently, and it abides in the Church to this day. "With an 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 275 

astounding energy and courage the apostles began to publish 
openly, before friends and foes alike, the fact of the risen 
Christ; and on this fact they founded the faith and the 
existence of Christianity. Henceforth their watchword down 
through all the succeeding ages has been, The Crucified and 
Eisen Lord. On that one truth the very existence and life of 
the Church repose. The Church, accordingly, is a living and 
perpetuating monument of Christ's resurrection. 

/?) Another monument is the Christian Sabbath. The 
transfer from the seventh to the first day of the week for its 
observance is not, and never was, claimed on the ground of a 
specific command. But the New Testament is by no means a 
booh of mere specific commands. It is rather the embodiment 
of great principles looking to great spiritual ends, for the 
advantage of man's spiritual life. "The Sabbath was made 
for man, and not man for the Sabbath ; therefore the Son of 
man is Lord also of the Sabbath." It would indeed be a fal- 
lacy in reasoning to suppose that a specific command was in- 
dispensable for the radical and revolutionary change from 
Judaism to Christianity; from the system of sacrifices and 
ceremonies of the ancient Jews to the faith and institutions of 
the Christian Church. It is precisely so in the change from 
the Jewish to the Christian Sabbath, of which each was 
distinctively an integral and representative part of its own 
religious system. The Sabbaths went and came with their 
respective systems. In the absence of any express requirement 
from Christ, either to abolish or continue the Jewish national 
Sabbath, the change made was as radical and absolute as the 
change in the system to which it belonged. 

This legitimates the inquiry for the principle and the 
authority involved in the change of the Sabbath days. The 
principle is discoverable in the distinctive object of the Sabbath 
observed, and the authority for the change in the example and 
practice of the authorized apostles themselves. Jesus was with 
his disciples forty days, "speaking of the things pertaining to 



276 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



the kingdom of God " after his rising. Much of those instruc- 
tions and authorizations remains unwritten in the Gospels ; but 
all, as we would naturally expect, was wrought into the practice 
of the early Church, when the apostles laid its foundations, 
and reconstructed its institutions and monuments, " built upon 
the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ him- 
self being the chief corner-stone." Now, as to the objects had 
in view, the Jewish Sabbath was set apart to be commemora- 
tive of God's creation, as a finished work / and the Christian 
Sabbath was set apart as commemorative of Christ's finished 
redemption, "even the redemption of your body." Hence it 
has always been religiously observed by acts of worship and 
service in celebration of Christ's resurrection. By so much as 
our redemption as God's loving act transcends the work of 
creation of the world, by so much is the Christian Sabbath 
superior and supreme touching man's spiritual interests. This 
should be constantly kept in sight as a determining factor in 
the change effected in the day. So much as to the objects 
contemplated respecting the two Sabbaths and their religious 
observance. 

In regard to the practice of the primitive Church in inaugu- 
rating the Christian Sabbath with its new and special object 
for observance, there was no specific command for the continu- 
ance of the Jewish Sabbath while yet the whole Jewish system 
was absolutely abolished. To that system it distinctively be- 
longed, in which it was a most conspicuous institution. For a 
period the apostles, all being Jewish Christians, naturally felt 
at liberty to employ the old sacrificial observances in their wor- 
ship in the temple, in which they had been religiously edu- 
cated and developed; but the time drew near when Judaism 
and Christianity separated. On the Jewish Sabbath day, the 
tenth day of August, in A. D. 70, the ancient temple itself was 
burned down by the Komans, the fires of sacrifice upon its 
altars were forever extinguished, and the whole Jewish system 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. ^77 

was absolutely abolished and abandoned. The nation was ex- 
patriated and dispersed, and in no land since has there been 
erected a Jewish altar for sacrificial offering to God. The 
practice of the apostles, commissioned especially as they were 
by Christ for their work, must be regarded as the sufficient 
authority for the Sabbatic change in the day. For it must 
be obvious that, however they may have acted without the 
written requirement from Christ, they could not have acted 
without his unwritten authority. It would indeed be a violent 
presumption to assume that the first thing the apostles did 
in their new commission was to discard the old Sabbath when 
it was meant that it should be preserved and perpetuated, and 
proceed to institute and inaugurate a new Sabbath without 
authority. And if the claim were made that the old Sab- 
bath was incorporated in the Decalogue, and especially em- 
phasized as no other command was, "Remember the Sabbath 
day to keep it holy," the sufficient reply is, that the require- 
ment was to remember the Sabbath day, but not to remember 
the seventh day. And this is done in the observance of the 
Christian Sabbath; for all that was sacred and obligatory in 
the old was reverently transferred and perpetuated to the new 
Sabbath. In the original Sabbath room was left for such trans- 
fer, in that, in every one of the six days mentioned, there was a 
limitation by the evening and the morning ; but the seventh or 
the Sabbath was left without such limitation. 137 It was there- 
fore open and free for the apostles, in organizing the Christian 
Church in separation from the Jewish Church, to institute the 
new day appropriate to the new faith, in the new Church, for 
the new era in human history. 

What, then, does the practice of the apostles and their suc- 
cessors prove and illustrate touching the change from the 
seventh to the first day of the week? 



i3T Compare Gen. i, 31, and ii, 2, 



278 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

a . The apostles themselves, in recognition of the Christian 
Sabbath day, very distinctively and significantly called it "The 
Lord's Day" and they restricted its religious observance to 
"the first day of the week" 138 

b . In the newly found document known as the Teaching 
of the Apostles (dating about A. D. 70), the Christian Sabbath 
is emphasized as "the Lord's own day." It reads: "Gather 
yourselves together and break bread and give thanks." 

c . The Apostolic Fathers, who were personally taught by 
the apostles in the observances of the Christian doctrine and 
faith, have in turn recorded their teachings for the Church 
thus: 

Barnabas (A. D. 70) says: 

"Your present Sabbaths are not acceptable to me. , . . [God 
says ] I will make a [ new ] beginning of the eighth day . . . where- 
fore we keep the Lord's day with joyfulness ; the day on which Jesus 
rose from the dead. " 189 

Ignatius (A. D. 107) says: 

"If, then, those who walked in the ancient practices attain unto 
newness of hope, no longer observing Sabbaths, but fashioning their lives 
after the Lord's day, on which our Life also arose through him, . . . 
that we may be found disciples of Jesus Christ, our only Teacher." 140 

d. Justin Martyr, the Apologist (135-145), says: 

" Sunday is a day on which we all hold our common assembly, be- 
cause it is the first day of the week on which God, having wrought a 
change in the darkness and matter, made the world ; and Jesus Christ 
our Savior on the day he rose from the dead. . . . And on the day 
called Sunday all who live in cities or in the country gather in one 
place and the Memoirs [i. e., the Gospels] of the apostles, or the writings 
of the prophets, are read as long as time permits." 141 

e. Irengeus, Bishop of Lyons (178) wrote: "The mystery 
of the Lord's resurrection may not be celebrated on any other 
day than the Lord's Day." 142 

«s See Rev. i, 10; Acts xx, 7; 1 Cor. xvi, 2; John xx, 19, 26. 
™ Epis.c.15. i*o Epis.to Mag. 9. 141 First Apol. c. 67. 

i« See McClintock and Strong's Cyclop, v, 507. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 279 

f . Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage (200-258), mentions "the 
Lord's Day" as both "the first and the eighth day." 143 

Now, as has been noted elsewhere, accounting that the 
Christian era began, according to corrected chronology, B. C. 4, 
and that the crucifixion occurred about twenty-nine years 
afterward, reckoning on to the opening of the year 1900, the 
Christian Sabbath will have been celebrated continuously 
throughout Christendom no less than 97,292 times as an act 
and observance monumental of the resurrection of Christ* 

YI. Modern Theories of the Resurrection. 

Skeptical critics, feeling the power of the fact in the Chris- 
tian system, have sought to explain the occurrence of the 
resurrection of Jesus, in the one case, by the theory of an 
abnormal condition of Christ's body ; in another, by the abnor- 
mal condition of the apostles' minds. Both are baseless suppo- 
sitions illustrative of an evasion of the real fact, and neither 
offers a substantial reason to support the position assumed. If 
one theory would prove the proposition, the other would thereby 
be disproved as the theory; but both theories assume what 
neither proves nor can prove, by simply begging the question, 
which is so much more convenient for the advocates. 

When Ferdinand Christian Baur openly affirmed that the 
nature of Christ's resurrection was not a proper subject for 
historical investigation, his position was severelv 

y ' r J §201 F.C.Baur 

criticised by Strauss as being an evasion of the and the 
main point at issue between Christianity and Resurrectlon - 
all negative criticism. Nevertheless, in that particular, Baur 
was clearly right. For obviously the nature of an event is 
one thing, and its historical occurrence as a fact is another. 
If a miracle was something to be explained on natural prin- 
ciples, then the nature of the resurrection would be that which 

* For a development of the Evidence and Argument respecting the Christian 
Sabbath, see $$ 105-120. i« McClintock and Strong's Cyclop, v, 507. 



280 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

belongs to philosophy, and not to the department of historicity. 
Of course, it is the legitimate function of Christian evidence to 
traverse the past fact of the resurrection of Jesus as a subject 
of historical inquiry, the same as any other event of the past, 
without engaging to explain the miracle-power by which it was 
brought to pass. 

The hind of evidence which one has a right to expect on 

an historical question of antiquity should be carefully noted in 

the outset. No event outside of science can be 

§202. The 

Evidence treated with mathematical proof. The resurrec- 
pp ica e. ^ on . g no ^. an even t to which mathematics applies. 

Being a miraculous occurrence its nature can not be explained 
by reason. For, as Schelling has remarked, " Nothing is more 
doleful than the occupation of all rationalists who strive to 
make that rational which declares itself above reason." It 
does not address itself to any of the physical senses in the pres- 
ent time. It is not something that can be known by our men- 
tal intuitions, because it is not a subject to be contemplated by 
the common, the necessary, and spontaneous perceptions of man- 
kind, which are the characteristics of our intuitions. It 
claims to be an historical truth, and is to be investigated as 
such exclusively, as in the case of any other event of the past. 
An occurrence which by its own force has wrought such deep 
and enduring conviction in the minds of men for a period of 
nearly twenty centuries ; which all the scorn and persecution of 
enemies could not suppress; which has changed the course of 
history on earth, is an occurrence of paramount importance in 
history, and is to be accounted for historically on the principle 
of reason and common sense. But the investigation must be 
conducted in the interests of truth, not in the interests of pre- 
possessions or a priori bias of mind, or the inquiry will neces- 
sarily be onesided and nugatory. The two principal theories 
of the negative school which are offered in lieu of the resur- 
rection of Christ, will now command attention. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 281 

I. The Theory of the Swoon. 

Paulus of Heidelburg is prominent among those who have 
advocated this hypothesis. In substance it holds to the view 
that Jesus did not actually die upon the cross, as § 2 o3. Theory 
all the Gospels represent, but that, through his ofPaulus - 
intense sufferings so prolonged, he lost consciousness and fell 
into a swoon, which lasted three days, when animation re- 
turned — possibly by reason of the sweet spices administered, 
which restored the body to its normal condition. It is further 
maintained that the body of Jesus was laid in the rock-hewn 
cave, but upon recovering consciousness, in some unknown 
way, he escaped death and the guard, and went unaided to 
his friends and their tender ministries. He lingered awhile 
in obscurity, and finally died a natural death, and was buried 
privately by friends. 

In all this, Paulus believed that something did happen ac- 
cording to the G-ospels, but discredits the G-ospel account because 
of this stupendous miracle ! It must be admitted that the hy- 
pothesis is an admirable piece of imagination, although utterly 
destitute of historical proof. Its chief fallacy lies in the fact 
that it assumes to be true that which remains to be proved. 
Moreover, the theory encounters insuperable difficulties. It 
fails to account for all the phenomena involved in the case. 
It ignores the statement of Matthew that Pilate was amazed 
that Jesus had died so soon, and the procurator would not sur- 
render his body even to Joseph of Arimathea, a Sanhedrist, 
without first dispatching his own military officer of the day 
to ascertain the fact of his death, and report the same to him- 
self in person. It ignores the statement of Mark, that when 
Pilate received the centurion's confirmation that Jesus was 
dead, he granted " the dead body" * to Joseph for interment. It 
fails to explain how a man who had endured for six hours 
the mortal agonies on the cross, spiked through the hands and 

*7TT<3 j aa, expressly" a dead body, a corpse. 



282 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

feet, his heart pierced through by the soldier's spear, with the 
necessary loss of blood and vitality, would swoon away rather 
than die, then recover consciousness, and, when weak and help- 
less and alone, could break the procurators seal and roll back 
the great stone at the door of the sepulcher which imprisoned 
him, and in the presence of an armed military guard, especially 
appointed to keep the body in its custody, escape to his friends 
unseen. It fails to account for that perfect and profound con- 
viction, not transient but enduring, that his followers experi- 
enced when they were suddenly lifted out of the depths of 
despondency and despair, and filled with a deathless hope, 
and began at once to proclaim the risen Jesus, right at Jeru- 
salem where he had just been crucified, in the courts of the 
temple to the people, and in the hall of the rulers before the 
Sanhedrists of the nation. 

The notion of a swoon is not only incompatible with the 
only authentic accounts given, but is without any authority 
whatever from any ancient history. It fails completely to ac- 
count for the founding and continuance of the Christian 
Church, if based upon a known falsehood; for if Jesus was 
then and afterwards in the private keeping of his friends, 
they must have known that the claim of a resurrection was a 
false pretense, and his claim to the Messiaship a base impos- 
ture. But here develops a change of base; the theory of a 
swoon becomes displaced by that of fraud. 

Strauss voices the view of other skeptics on this point. He 
says: 

" It is impossible that a being who had stolen half dead out of the 
sepulcher, who crept about weak, wanting medical treatment, who re- 
quired bandaging, strengthening, and nursing, and who at last yielded 
to his sufferings, could have given to the disciples the impression that 
he was a Conqueror over death and the grave, the Prince of Life — an 
impression which lay at the basis of their future ministry. Such a 
resuscitation could only have weakened the impression which he had 
made upon them in their life and death ; but could by no possibility 
have changed their sorrow into enthusiasm, have elevated their rever- 



The Resueeection of Jesus Cheist. 283 

ence into worship." 144 "The historian must acknowledge that the dis- 
ciples firmly believed that Jesus was risen." And "the fact that the 
Apostle Paul heard from the mouth of Peter, of James, and of others 
besides, that Jesus had appeared to them ; and that they all, and also 
the five hundred, were absolutely convinced that they had seen Jesus 
living after he had died, is one which we will not call in question." 146 

Baur insists that — 

"History must hold to the assertion that the faith of the disciples 
in the resurrection of Jesus Christ was a fact, and indisputable. It is on 
this faith only that Christianity found a ground solid enough to erect 
upon it the superstructure of its whole historic development." " Noth- 
ing but the miracle of the resurrection could disperse the doubts which 
threatened to drive faith into the eternal night of death. For the faith of the 
disciples of Jesus became the most solid and most irrefutable certainty." 146 

Dr. Ewald speaks the final word : 

"Nothing is historically more certain than that Christ rose from 
the dead, and appeared to his own ; and that this their vision was the 
beginning of a new, higher faith, and all their Christian labors." 147 

It must be admitted that they who think that the Chris- 
tian faith is too credulous, should be careful not to tax too 
severely our credulity in their theories, instead of our belief. 
It is too much to ask us to believe that which exists only in 
their own imagination to be historical, being unsupported by 
sound reason or foundation in fact. Worse than all, it is an 
explanation which fails to explain. 

II. The Theory op Hallucination. 

This hypothesis is more commonly known as " The Vision 
Theory" and has found a wider acceptance by those of the 
skeptical school than the theory of the swoon. 
It postulates that the reappearances of Jesus Prevailing 
alive after his death were merely subjective to eory * 

the minds of his friends, but were without any objective 
reality in fact. In other words, it was all merely an imaginary 

"* New Life of Jesus i, 412. »« Leben Jesu, 1864, p. 289. 

i« First Three Centuries, Vol. I, 39-42. 
WHist. of Apostolic Age, Vol. VI, 52, 69, et seq. 



284 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

illusion, an hallucination of the mind due to the intensely 
morbid condition of the friends of Jesus in their anguish after 
his crucifixion, when their sensitive souls were thrilled with 
the expectancy of seeing him alive again. Kenan refers the 
whole story of his being seen alive again to the authority of 
Mary Magdalene, who, with the glow of a fictionist exclaims : 
"Divine power of love! Sacred moments when the passion 
of a woman under hallucination gives the world a God re- 
stored from the dead!" This view of the Magdalene was first 
hinted by Celsus* in the second century; but it was afterward 
revived and modified by the philosophical Jew named Spi- 
noza ; and more recently it was developed by Strauss, Kenan, 
and in England, by the author of the work entitled Super- 
natural Religion. Strauss refers the origin of the account of 
the resurrection to the vision of the apostles in the region of 
Galilee, but Kenan refers it to Mary Magdalene at the tomb 
of Jesus at Jerusalem. 

In order to postulate the theory of self-delusion, it is abso- 
lutely neccessary to discredit the evidence of the senses, with all 
the conclusions which they legitimate in our con- 

§205. The * * 

Theory and its sciousness. For the witnesses of his resurrection 
do solemnly affirm that Jesus Christ did rise 
from the dead: " Whereof we are all witnesses." They affirm 
this upon the evidence of the three senses — sight, hearing, 
and touch — the very senses by which we cognize personality 
and the occurrence of events everywhere in the common 
course of life. In courts of law the senses of the witnesses 
are regarded as being as absolutely reliable as are our own. 
It is upon the evidence of what the witnesses have seen and 
heard directly in the case involved, and therefore know, that 
criminals have been condemned to the dungeon and the scaf- 
fold in all the centuries of the civilizations. If one should 
dare to distrust the evidences of his own senses, he would fur- 



*Celsus, speaking of Christ exhibiting his wounds, says: "Who beheld 
this? A half-frantic woman as you state 1 ' (in the Gospels). (Origen contra 
Celsum, ii, 59.) 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 285 

nish the best evidence of his inanity or insanity. If we have 
the absolute right to claim the evidence of our sense-intuitions 
for ourselves, so have others the absolute right to claim it for 
themselves. We can not deny their claim. Is it not a violent 
presumption which attempts to set aside, without the slightest 
proof of abnormal mind, the conscious convictions of more 
than five hundred sensible witnesses to any given fact? 
"Would this assumption and presumption be countenanced for 
one moment in any civil court? Would this postulate be at- 
tempted in any other case than that of Christ's rising, or 
even in that, but with a view of escaping the miracle of the 
resurrection, and all that that necessitates f Wisely does Dr. 
Yan Oosterzee remark : 

" We feel how boundless is the caprice which would remove the glo- 
rious solution from the history of the life of Jesus, and transfer it hence- 
forth to the history of the apostles and their self-deception !" 148 

Upon the other hand, this hypothesis is itself beset with 
difficulties insuperable. Its character is such that it can com- 
mand credence with only that class of persons who are super- 
stitious enough to believe in seeing ghosts. This certainly de- 
mands a stretch of credulity too exorbitant to find acceptance 
on the part of persons of intelligence and good sense. The hy- 
pothesis is put at unqualified disadvantage when offered as a 
substitute for the faith which we repose in the supreme fact 
of a risen Eedeemer. Does it not border on insane credulity 
to believe that "more than five hundred" persons in the 
mountains of Galilee were suddenly seized with a mania, all 
at the same time, in thinking that they saw the same specter ; 
that the delusion began at a distinct date, continued just forty 
days, and then ceased forever as suddenly as it began — an 
hypothesis which is without a parallel in all the superstitious 
stories of ghost-seeing ? Moreover, we are asked to believe 
that this mental hallucination extended itself so as to com- 



1 Dogmatics, ii, 569. 



286 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

mand the credence of multitudes of others ; that the Christian 
Church, with all its code of moral and spiritual requirements, 
and all its experience in spiritual development among the mil- 
lions of mankind through nearly two thousand years since — 
a Church composed of the wisest and best portions of all the 
civilizations — is founded on the merest delusion ! JSTor is it to 
be rationally believed that at the outset the Jews, who in 
their fierce instigation crucified Jesus of Nazareth, should 
become converted to the faith by the thousand within a few 
days, 149 and a large company of the priests become deluded 
into an " obedience to the faith." 150 

The hypothesis fails at the initial point of Christianity, as 
it fails to account for the existence and continuance of the 
Christian Church. On the historical side of this question, how 
does the theory of vision explain what became of the body of 
Jesus? The empty sepulcher demands an explanation on the 
part of those who have ignored it in their theory. That the 
body of Jesus was duly sepulchered in the tomb of Joseph 
of Arimathea is a matter of history, and stands undisputed. 
How did it escape the vigilance of the military guard, and 
what became of it after it passed from their custody ? The 
advocates of this theory must account for all the phenomena 
involved in the case. Either the body of Jesus remained in 
the tomb, or it was removed by human hands, or it arose from 
the dead. If it remained, why did not the Jewish Sanhedrists 
produce it, and boldly refute the bolder claim of the apostles 
when they were arraigned before the Council and unhesitat- 
ingly affirmed, " The God of our fathers raised up Jesus whom 
ye crucified. . . . Him hath God exalted with his own 
right hand to be a Prince and Savior?" 151 If the body was 
removed by friends, the apostles, in preaching his rising as a 
fundamental fact to the Christian religion, were guilty of the 
basest duplicity and imposture, and they knew it to be so. 
But to maintain this is to confess that the theory of the delu- 

i« Acts ii, 41. 150 77). vi, 7. 151 lb. v, 30, 81. 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 287 

sion has failed, and given place to the theory of fraud. As 
Dr. Schaff justly remarks : 

11 The Vision hypothesis, instead of getting rid of the miracle, only- 
shifts it from fact to fiction ; it makes an empty delusion more powerful 
than the truth, or turns all history into delusion. Before we can reason 
the resurrection of Christ out of history we must reason the apostles 
and Christianity out of existence. "We must either admit the miracle 
or frankly confess that we stand before an inexplicable mystery." 
"This illusion we are expected to believe by these unbelievers, gave 
birth to the most real and most mighty of all facts, the Christian Church, 
which has lasted these eighteen hundred years, and is now spread all 
over the civilized world, embracing more members than ever, and exer- 
cising more moral power than all other religions combined." 152 

Certainly it can not be claimed that the delusion supposed 
could have been due to the favorable predisposition and antici- 
pation of the apostles. The plain record relied upon renders 
that proposition utterly untenable. When the Magdalene 
went alone and reported to the apostles that she had seen 
Jesus alive, they only " mourned and wept," and " they be- 
lieved not." When the women went together and " told these 
things unto the apostles, their words seemed to them as idle 
tales, and they believed them not." When Jesus " appeared 
unto the eleven as they sat at meat" he "upbraided them 
with their unbelief and hardness of heart because they believed 
not them which had seen him after he was risen." When all 
the apostles in their turn told Thomas, "We have seen 
the Lord," Thomas replied, " Except I shall see in his hands 
the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the 
nails, ... I will not believe." And even after this, when 
Jesus was seen by the multitude in the mountain in Galilee, 
" some doubted." Evidently these facts and this language do 
not admit, but are absolutely destructive of, the theory that 
delusion arose out of the expectation of the apostles that 
Jesus would rise from the sepulcher of death. 

ISor can it be denied that these witnesses had opportunity 
under every variety of circumstances to see and test the reality 

152 Hist. Christ. Church, i, p. 183. 
19 



288 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

of the risen Jesus ; for he is recorded as seen by witnesses ; 
some at a distance, but of tener close at hand ; sometimes in- 
dividually by persons alone, but oftener by small gatherings, 
as the apostles, or by the great multitude together. He was 
seen in the light of the early morning, as by Mary Magdalene 
at the sepulcher; he was seen in the brightness of the noonday 
sun, as by Paul journeying to Damascus; he was seen toward 
the close of the afternoon, as by the two who talked with him 
on the way to Emmaus ; he was seen under the cover of night, 
as by the apostles as they sat at meat in Jerusalem ; he was 
seen by the disciples at their nets at the seaside, by the multi- 
tude on the mountains of Galilee, by two of the Seventy in the 
country on the public highway, as well as in the city full, by 
those who had not rejected him ; and by all in the nearest 
possible personal relations. Their sight was confirmed by the 
sense of touch, for some came and held him by the feet. He 
himself said to his disciples : " Behold my hands and my feet 
that it is I myself ; handle me and see ; for a spirit hath not 
flesh and bones as ye see me have. And when he said this, he 
showed them his hands and his feet." But he was cognized 
not only by the sight of their eyes, but also his voice was 
heard by their ears. For altogether unlike the stories of the 
silent specters, there were occasions when he conversed famil- 
iarly and at great length with his friends, at once demonstrat- 
ing the fact of his resurrection and teaching them the special 
significance of his rising in its relation to the future Church, 
" speaking to them of the things pertaining to the kingdom of 
God." And withal Jesus ate fish in the presence of his 
disciples, to identify himself to their fullest recognition ; and 
he ate at the table with his disciples, as in the old-time fellow- 
ship of his ministry. So that these witnesses tested and at- 
tested without hesitation or qualification : 

"Him God raised up on the third day, and showed him openly, not 
to all the people, but unto witnesses chosen of God, even to us who did 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 289 

eat and drink with him after he rose from the dead. 153 For " He was seen 
many days of them that came up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem, who 
were witnesses unto the people." 15 * 

So that it is conclusive that Jesus was seen alive after his 
death, not by one single person alone, or by merely one 
class of persons apart, or on one transient occasion, or on many 
transient occasions, but often and continuously, and by as 
many as a great multitude, and for a period of forty days. 

The eminent Bishop Westcott pointedly remarks : 

"The ground on which the apostles rested their appeal was the res- 
urrection ; the function which they claimed for themselves was to bear 
witness to it. Their belief was not an idle assent, but the spring of a 
new life. And the belief itself was of a new kind. It was not like the 
affectionate credulity with which an oppressed state or party believes in 
the reappearance of a lost leader. It was a confession of error before 
it was an assertion of faith. It involved a renunciation of popular 
dogmas in which those who held it had been reared. It proclaimed a 
truth altogether new and unlike any which men had held before. If 
ever the idea of delusion can be excluded, it must be in a case when it is 
alleged to explain a conviction which transformed at once the cherished 
opinions of a large body of men of various characters and powers, for 
which outwardly they had no inclination or advantage." 155 

The eminent Dr. Keim, who once advocated this theory in 
a modified form, afterward stated : 

"The unhesitating denial of the resurrection in spite of the serious 
difficulties which exist in conflict with the belief of so many among the 
laity, is the fruit of neither a scientific nor a religious conscience. We are 
not able to comprehend how the Christian Church, with all its clearness 
of mind, with all its earnestness of moral purpose, could have been 
founded as the result of an overexcited vision." 

To this Dr. Schaff adds this further testimony : 

"In his last word on the great problem, Keim, in view of the ex- 
haustion and failure of the natural explanations [of the resurrection], 
comes to the conclusion that we must either humbly confess our igno- 
rance or return to the faith of the apostles who have seen the Lord." 156 



163 Acts x, 40, 41. 164 lb. xiii, 31. 155 Gospel of the Resurrection, p. 124. 
!56 See Schafl's Hist. Christ. Church, Vol. I, p. 185. 



290 Historical Evidence of the ISTew Testament. 

It is related of Cardinal Talleyrand, of Paris, that he was 
once approached by Larevelliere-Lepeaux, who was a member 
of the French Directory, a Deistical philanthropist, who was 
the originator of a new religion to displace Christianity; but 
to his great disappointment he could not get his propaganda 
introduced. He sought counsel of the cardinal, who seemed 
to condole with him, but said that the introduction of a new 
religion was no easy task. The polite but shrewd cardinal 
hesitatingly suggested that there remained one thing which 
would give hope of success. "What is it?" said Lepeaux. 
" It is this, " replied the cardinal : " Go and be crucified, then 
be buried, and then rise again on the third day ; and then go 
right on working miracles — raising the dead, healing all man- 
ner of diseases, and casting out demons, and possibly you 
might succeed!" The proposition had the suggestive effect, 
and he left the cardinal in silence. 

III. The Witness op Modern Skeptics. 

The following concessions touching the resurrection of Jesus 
made by modern skeptics have their evidential value. The 
several authors cited are recognized as of the foremost scholarly 
critics of the negative school; and the perfect candor with 
which they treat the subject entitles the writers to profound 
respect. 

Dr. Theodore Keim, of Zurich, whose Life of Christ is 
§206. conces- regarded as altogether the best production em- 
Dr. Keim. anating from the school of Freethinkers, says : 

" After all these considerations, we shall have to admit that the re- 
cent and strongly-favored theory is nothing but an hypothesis which ex- 
plains some things, but leaves the main point unexplained, even as the 
main facts which have been historically subjected to wrong and weak 
points of view. But if the attempt equally fails to maintain the tradi- 
tional history of the resurrection ; if the attempt by means of visions of St. 
Paul fails to build up a natural explanation of things which happened, — 
there remains for history no other way than the admission that the 
voluble statements of the legendary history, and the dark brevity of the 
authentic history, do not allow us to establish a certain invincible result 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 291 



of the enigmatical termination of the life of Jesus, however important 
they may have been in themselves and in their influence upon universal 
history. For the benefit of history, in so far as it calculates with 
known factors and with a series of tangible recognized causes and effects, 
there exists the undoubted fact, only the firm faith of the apostles that 
Jesus has risen, and the immense effect by this faith, namely, the con- 
version of mankind." 157 

Dr. Georg Heinrich August von Ewald, of conces- 

Gottingen (died 1875), in History of the Apostolic sion of 

Age, held that Christ's resurrection was wholly 

spiritual, a continuous manifestation of him, whatever that 

may mean. He says : 

"Nothing is historically more certain than that Christ rose from the 
dead, and appeared to his own ; and that this their vision was the begin- 
ning of their higher faith and of all their Christian labors." "But it is 
just as certain that they saw him again — not as an ordinary man, or as a 
shadow rising out of the grave, or as a ghost, as the legend tells us of 
such — but as the only Son of God ; as an absolutely superior and supreme 
Being ; and that when thinking of the past they could not imagine other- 
wise than that whoever was favored to see him again, had also imme- 
diately recognized his sole Divine dignity, and that they have firmly 
believed on him. But as the true King and Son of God, the Twelve and 
others had already learned to know him during his lifetime ; the only 
difference being that they now recollect him also in regard to his purely 
Divine side, and by that as a Conqueror of Death. There is, conse- 
quently, after all, the earthly Christ as he was known to them so well, 
and an inner relationship between that usual beholding of Jesus and 
that higher rapturous beholding of the heavenly Christ ; so that they 
would not have recognized him even in these first days and weeks after 
his death as the heavenly Messiah, had they not known him previously 
so well as the earthly one." 158 

Dr. Daniel Schenkel of Heidelburg, when advocating the 
Vision or Hallucination theory of a real but annn „ 

J §208. Conces- 

purely spiritual manifestation of Christ, though sion of 
thoroughly convinced that on this fact rests the 
institution of the Christian Church, acknowledged himself un- 
able to solve the problem of the resurrection of Jesus, and says : 
" Never will historical investigation succeed in solving the enigma 
of the belief in the resurrection. But nothing is more sure in history 
than the fact that on the belief in this rests the institution of the 
Christian Church. . . . Over against this hypothesis of visions which 

157 Geschichte Jesu von Nazara, iii, 600. Keim died in Giessen in 1879. 

™Hist. of the Apostolic Age (Geschichte des Volkes Israel, Vol. VI, 52, 69, sqq.) 



292 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

tries to explain the appearances of Christ to his disciples as illusions of 
the senses, having their origin physical and therefore psychical in the 
intensification of the nervous and intellectual life, stands especially the 
keynote of the mood in the disciples, especially in Peter — the deep sad- 
ness, very humble self-confidence, the lost courage for life ; how from 
such a mood proceeded the transfigured image of the resurrected One, 
with this absolute certainty and indestructible joy through which the 
belief in the resurrection was able to firmly maintain the Church in al] 
storms and persecutions ?" 159 

Dr. Ferdinand Christian Baur, of Tubingen, who is called 
o«™ „ "the master-critic" of the skeptical Church his^ 

§209. Con- r 

cession of torians, and "the corypheus" of the Tubingen 
school, in his revised edition of the First Three 
Centuries™ published just before he died (in 1860), says : 

" Nothing but the miracle of the resurrection could disperse the 
doubts which threatened to drive faith into the eternal night of death." 
' It is true that the nature of the resurrection lies outside of historical 
investigation, . . . for to the faith of the disciples the resurrection of 
Jesus became a most solid and most irrefutable certainty. In whatever 
light we may consider the resurrection of Jesus, whether as an actual 
objective miracle or a subjective psychological one, even granting the 
possibility of such a miracle, no psychological analysis can penetrate the 
inner spiritual process by which, in the consciousness of the disciples, 
their belief at the death of Jesus was transformed into a belief of his 
resurrection. . . . We must rest satisfied with this : that for them 
the resurrection of Christ was a fact of their consciousness, and had for 
them all the reality of an historical event. " "While the historical crit- 
icism has nothing to do with the inquiry concerning what the resurrec- 
tion was in fact, it must hold fast to the assertion that, in the belief of 
the first disciples, it had become an established and incontrovertible cer- 
tainty. What was presupposed as the essential foundation of this his- 
tory is not the fact that Jesus rose from the dead, but that it was be- 
lieved that he had risen. However we may seek to explain the faith, the 
resurrection of Jesus had become to the first Christians a fact of convic- 
tion, and had for them all the reality of an historical fact." 

In consideration of the failure of these efforts to explain 

the resurrection of Jesus on mere natural principles, the force 

s2io The anc ^ truth expressed by Beyschlag is sufficiently 

close. manifest: "It is infinitely easier to admit that 

the Christian Church is the offspring of a miracle than to 

imagine it to be born of a lie." Upon the other hand, the 

159 Characterbild Jesu, p. 231, sqq., 1864. 

«° Geschichte der Christ. Kirche, Band i, S.39, f. (Vol. I, pp. 39, 48, 42). 



The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. 293 

intelligent and thoughtful mind must ever be impressed with 
a sense of the utter futility, not to say frivolity, of attempting 
to found Christianity upon a swoon, or a delusion, and thence 
perpetuated itself with such high character and great princi- 
ples for living, amidst the fiercest oppositions of every kind, 
down through the centuries. Now, in consideration of what 
the Christian system is in itself, and what it teaches, enjoins, 
and enforces upon those who embrace it; of the place and 
power which it has attained and maintained among the best 
and foremost civilizations of the world ; how it has introduced 
a new course of history for mankind ; how its principles have 
gained credence and become incorporated into the best gov- 
ernments of the most advanced nations of the earth, modifying 
the horrors of war, bringing honor and prosperity in times of 
peace, enforcing equity and uprightness between man and man 
in society, giving happiness in the relations of the family in 
the home, enjoining purity of character and life upon the indi- 
vidual, imparting a strengthening with noble courage to meet 
the severest trials in our probation, and withal, inspiring in the 
Christian an imperishable hope of the immortal life beyond 
death, — these considerations legitimate the induction that the 
Christian religion is founded, not upon an imaginary swoon or 
delusion, but upon a fact and truth supreme, that its Founder, 
Jesus Christ, must have risen, and actually did rise from the 
dead — an event proportionate with such results — as is affirmed 
by the apostles who saw him alive again, and has ever been 
steadfastly believed by all Christians in all Christendom. 

1. The negation of his resurrection raises greater difficulties 

than the miracle itself. 

2. This supernatural event has never been refuted by adver- 

saries on historical grounds. 

3. The admission of his resurrection renders easy the admis- 

sion of other miracles also. 

4. The resurrection of Christ opens the gates of immortality 

to all believers in Christ. 



CHAPTEE XI. 
THE ASCENSION OF JESUS CHEIST. 

1. The Scriptural Eepresentations op the Ascension. 

2. The Fact either Conceded or Affirmed by Adversaries. 

By Rabbinical Writers: the Targum, Talmud, and Toledoth Jeshu. 
By Roman Writers who affirm it: Hierocles and Porphyry. 

3. The Event Perpetuated later Historically in Current Literature. 

By the Ancient Fathers: Barnabas, Poly carp, and Irenseus. 

By Christian Apologists: Aristides, Justin, Melito, and Tertullian. 

4. The Teaching of the Apostles respecting the Ascension. 

By Paul in his First Four Epistles. 

By the Apostle John in the Book of Revelation. 

5. An Analysis of the Evidence Adduced, and the Conclusion. 

295 



Chapter XI. 
THE ASCENSION OF JESUS CHEIST. 

§211. Sources: Biographical Epitome, and Literature 

1. Melito (A. D. 170) was Bishop of Sardis, the ancient capital of Lydia, 
in Asia Minor. When he was made bishop is unknown ; but after 
the death of Aurelius Verus (169), Melito addressed an Apology to 
the Emperor Marcus Antoninus (reigned 161-180). But little is 
known of his life ; yet for many years he was the contemporary 
of Polycarp. Tertullian refers to his "elegant and oratorical 
genius." 

In order to secure a thoroughly-authenticated catalogue of the 
books of the New Testament he visited Palestine and its various 
localities, where prophetic utterances first found expression, and 
where facts occurred in fulfillment of the prophecies. Melito 
says that one Onesimus, who was a Christian, requested him "to 
make selections for him from the Law and the Prophets concern- 
ing the Savior and the Christian faith, as he desired to learn accu- 
rately the account of the old books, and having therefore gone to 
the East and reached the spot where [everything] was preached 
and done, and having learned accurately the books of the Old Tes- 
tament, I have sent a list of them." (Westcott, Canon, 221.) This 
catalogue is cited in detail in Eusebius (Eccl. Hist, iv, c. 26). From 
a rediscovered Syriac document containing Melito's treatise on 
Faith, translated by Dr. Cureton, the original of which is in the 
British Museum, we have the Confession of this period : 

"We have made collections from the Law and the Prophets 
relative to those things which have been declared respecting our 
Lord Jesus Christ, . . . who in David and the prophets fore- 
told his own sufferings ; who was incarnate in the Virgin, who was 
born in Bethlehem, who was wrapped in swaddling clothes in a 
manger, who was seen of the shepherds, who was glorified by 
angels, who was worshiped by the Magi, who was pointed out by 
John [the Baptist], who assembled the apostles, who preached the 
Kingdom, who healed the maimed, who gave light to the blind, 
who raised the dead, who appeared in the temple, who was be- 
lieved on by the people, who was betrayed by Judas, who was laid 
hold on by the priests, who was condemned by Pilate, who was 

297 



298 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

pierced in the flesh, who was hanged on the tree, who was buried 
in the earth, who rose from the dead, who appeared to the 
apostles, who ascended to heaven, who sitteth at the right hand of 
the Father, . . . who is God, the Son who is of the Father, 
Jesus Christ, the King for ever and ever. Amen." ("West. Canon, 
224-226.) 

§212. Ascension of Jesus Christ. 

Had nothing been told us about the fortieth day, we should not need to 
doubt that He lived glorified above ; but now we know from trust- 
worthy sources that he was exalted. We have no single reason to 
reject with distrust this satisfactory conclusion to the history of 
his earthly life. — Van Oosterzee. 

The ascension of the Lord forms the close of the resurrection, and the 
perfecting expression and act of exaltation.— Martensen. 

It is desirable that the close of the last vision which was common to all 
the apostles when he delivered to them his last commands, Jesus 
should be taken up into heaven. — Kenan. 

y '&iri<rTeudt) iv icdo-fxy, avek-q^drj iv doity — Believed on in the world, received up 
into glory. — Paul. 

This Jesus hath God raised up whereof we all are witnesses ; wherefore 
being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of 
the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he hath shed forth this 
which ye do see and hear. For David is not ascended into the 
heavens, but he saith unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand 
until I make thy foes thy footstool. — Peter. 

ARGUMENT. 

The resurrection and ascension of Jesus are distinct facts in themselves, 
yet are they so interrelated in nature and doctrine as to be re- 
garded as inseparable. This is clearly discernible in the history 
of our Lord's earthly existence, as it is also in thought in the 
system of Christian truth. The apostles place the two events to- 
gether in equal prominence and side by side in laying the founda- 
tions of Christianity. His resurrection from the dead having been 
known as miraculous, it is easy to understand that his ascension 
naturally follows and is necessitated. 

In the upward path of progress in the revelation of himself 
from his estate of humiliation to that of his exaltation, his rising 
from death to life marks the first stage; and his ascension on high 
marks the transitional period in his passage between earth and 
heaven in his return to the Father, from his redemptive work ac- 
complished to that of intercession, and marks the second stage; 
while the third is that realized when Jesus assumed the place of 



The Ascension of Jestjs Christ. 299 

power and royalty upon his indestructible throne as " King, eter- 
nal, IMMORTAL, INVISIBLE, THE ONLY WISE GOD." 1 It is thus that 

the ascension serves as a connecting link in the chain of events 
which at once reveals his supreme nature, his authority, and his 
glory with the Father. And as his resurrection furnished ample 
opportunity for his identification to believers as being that same 
One who was crucified and was dead and buried, so his ascension 
into heaven serves to illustrate his identification in second com- 
ing, both in fact and method, when " this same Jesus who was 
taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye 
have seen him go into heaven/' 2 So that his return to earth in 
judgment at the end of the world is not only the sequel of his 
ascending to heaven, but completes the circle of his prerogatives 
as "the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God 

BLESSED FOR EVERMORE. AMEN." 3 

1. The Scriptural Representations of the Ascension. 

2. The Fact conceded and affirmed by Adversaries. 

3. Its Truth perpetuated in the Current History. 

4. The Case defended by the Christian Apologists. 

5. The Apostolic Teaching respecting the Ascension. 

6. A Summing Up on all the Testimonies here adduced. 

An epitome of what is said in the Scriptures by Jesus 
respecting his ascension may helpfully precede and furnish the 
fact itself which is to be proved. Matthew, _„ m _. 

r ' §213. The Wit- 

though silent as regards the one circumstance ness of Jesus 

that J esus ascended on the fortieth day after his 

rising, when "a cloud received him out of their sight," 

records other facts in which this is conveyed by necessary 

implication. This is brought clearly to view in his report of 

the controversy which he had with the Pharisees, when the 

Lord asked them : 

11 How then doth David in Spirit call Him Lord, saying, The Lord 
said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand till I make thine enemies 
thy footstool ?" 4 To his disciples Jesus said: " Then shall appear the 
sign of the Son of man in heaven, . . . and they shall see the Son 
of man coming in the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory," 5 
" and all the holy angels with him ; then shall he sit upon the throne of 
His glory." 6 Again in the Sanhedrin, Caiaphas the high priest, said 
unto Jesus : " I adjure thee by the living God that thou tell us whether 

ilTim. i, 17. 2 Acts i, 11. 3R m.ix, 5. 

* Matt, xxii, 43, 44. sib. xxiv, 30. «Ib. xxv, 81. 



300 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

thou be the Christ, the Son of God. Jesus said unto him, Thou hast 
said. Nevertheless, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see the Son of 
man sitting at the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of 
heaven /"' 

There was special significance in Christ's mentioning before 
the Jewish Senate that hereafter he would occupy the place 
of power, " coming in the clouds of heaven" To their knowing 
minds it was a distinct claim that he was the realization of 
Daniel's prediction. 8 So that if the circumstance which char- 
acterized the great day of Christ's departure from earth is not 
remarked by this Evangelist, his return from heaven to earth 
"in power and great glory" is specially and certainly set forth 
by Matthew with sufficient explicitness and distinction. Dr 
Neander observes : 

" Even if none of the apostolic writers had mentioned this visible 
and real fact, we might have safely inferred from all that they say 
of Christ, that, in some form or other, they presupposed a supernatural 
exaltation from this visible earthly world." 9 

Mark's statement respecting the ascension of Christ is 
exceedingly brief and pointed. He compresses 

§214. Witness . ? J \ r 

of the other into a single sentence his entire deliverance on 
the sublime event which closed the earthly life 
and history of our Lord. It is this : 

"So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken unto them, was re- 
ceived up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God." 10 

Luke, at the close of his Gospel, as well as at the beginning 
of his Book of Acts, furnishes some interesting particulars 
touching the ascension. Professedly he voices the circum- 
stances of the occasion as stated by the apostles themselves, 
and by Mary the mother of Jesus, and others from whom he 
immediately derived his authenticated information. Grouping 
only those details which, as most important, we at this remote 



i Matt, xxvi, 63, 64. 8 Dan. vii, 13, 14. » Life of Jesus, c. ix. 

io Mark xvl, 19, of A. V., but omitted in tvro oldest MSS. 



The Ascension of Jestjs Christ. 301 

period most naturally are concerned to know, he says in his 

Gospel : 

"And he led them out until they were over against Bethany; and 
he lifted up his hands and blessed them. And it came to pass while he 
blessed them, he parted from them, and was carried up into heaven/' u 

He opens his Acts of the Apostles by speaking — 

" Concerning all that Jesus began both to do and to teach, until the 
day in which he was taken up, after that he had given commandment 
through the Holy Ghost unto the apostles whom he had chosen. . . . 
And when he had said these things, as they were looking, he was taken 
up ; and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they were 
looking steadfastly into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them 
in white apparel, who also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye looking 
into heaven ? This Jesus, who was received up from you into heaven, 
shall so come in like manner as ye beheld him going into heaven. Then 
returned they unto Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is 
nigh unto Jersusalem, a Sabbath-day's journey off." 12 

John also, as Matthew, records the sayings of Jesus himself, 

in these words : 

" I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place 
for you, I come again, and will receive you unto myself, that where I 
am, there ye may be also." 13 "I came out from the Father, and am 
come into the world ; again I leave the world, and go unto the Father." 14 
"And no man hath ascended into heaven, but he that descended out of 
heaven, even the Son of man." 16 "What then if ye should behold the 
Son of man ascending where he was before ?" 16 " Touch me not, for I 
am not yet ascended unto my Father." 17 

These are very explicit teachings of Christ touching his 
translation from earth to heaven. To the understanding of his 
disciples it was unusually clear and satisfactory. They exclaim : 
"Lo, now speakest thou plainly and speakest no proverb." 18 
So that the teachings of Jesus on this point were no mere 
imitations. 

Simon Peter, with great energy and persist- 82 i5. Peter and 
ency of purpose, bears witness, both orally and the Ascension - 
in writing, respecting the ascension and the doctrines involved. 

" Luke xxiv, 50, 51. la Acts i, 1, 2, 9-12. » John xiv, 2, 3. 

**Ib. xvi, 28; »J6.1ii, 13. ^J&.vi, 62. vib. xx, 17. 

18 lb. xvi, 29, irapprjciq. with unreservedness; . . . irapoi/xLav, no figurative 
saying. 



302 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Referring to the patriarch David, he solemnly affirms that 
God had 

" Sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins, One 
should sit upon his throne. He, foreseeing this, spake of the resurrection 
of the Christ. . . . Being therefore by the right hand of God exalted, 
and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he 
hath poured out this which ye see and hear. For David ascended not 
into the heavens ; but he saith himself, The Lord said unto my Lord, 
Sit thou on my right hand till I make thine enemies the footstool of 
thy feet. Let all the house of Israel therefore know assuredly that God 
hath made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom ye crucified." 
"And that he may send the Christ who hath been appointed for you, 
even Jesus ; whom the heavens must receive until the times of restora- 
tion of all things whereof God spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, 
who have been since the world began." "Ilim did God exalt with his 
right hand to be a Prince and a Savior to give repentance to Israel and 
remission of sins," " who is on the right hand of God, having gone into 
the heaven, angels and authorities and powers being made subject 
unto him." 19 

, _ „ „ , Before the Sanhedrin, Stephen witnessed to 

§ 216. Stephen ' r 

and the the exaltation of the ascended Christ, when 
"being full of the Holy G-host, he looked up 
steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus 
standing on the right hand of God." ffl 

To confirm these testimonies respecting the ascension in 
connection with the resurrection of Jesus, it remains to present 
« n » r™. m . the witness of profane writers who were hostile 

§217. The Wit- r _ . . 

ness of Adver- to Christ and Christianity. For it is made 
evident by both friends and foes, who had a 
right to know the truth whereof they affirm, that, rising from 
the dead, Jesus ascended into heaven, and assumed there the 
prerogatives of royalty. "He, because he abideth forever 
hath his priesthood unchangeable ; wherefore also he is able 
to save to the uttermost them that draw near unto God 
through him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for 
them." a 



19 Acts ii, 30, 33, 36 ; iii, 20, 21 ; v, 30, 31 ; 1 Pet. iii, 21, 22. 20 Acts vii, 55, 56. 

21 Heb. vii, 24, 25. 



The Ascension of Jesus Christ. 303 

a) Rabbinical writers have been careful to note that "Jesus 
calls himself the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven, 
and also Son of the clouds" ffl The word "anan" ffl in the Tar- 
gum, signifies " clouds" and is one of the designations of the 
Messiah. The significance of this reference to Daniel was 
understood by the Sanhedrists when Jesus was on trial before 
that Senate of judicature, and said to the president Caiaphas : 
" Hereafter ye shall see the Son of man sitting at the right hand 
of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven." u On Christ's 
part, it was an acknowledgment of his claim and title to the 
Messiahship. 

The Toledoth Jeshu also mentions that "Jesus predicted his 
own ascension into heaven." It gives the added testimony 
that he appropriated to himself two pre-eminent Psalms, the 
second, "Why do the heathen rage?" etc.; and the one hun- 
dred and tenth, " The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my 
right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool," etc. 25 

0) Two Roman writers also bear brief but pointed witness 
to Christ's ascension : Hierocles, who acknowledges that "Jesus 
ascended to heaven"™ and Porphyry, when he says: 

"That pious soul who ascended to heaven had, by a certain fatality, 
become an occasion of error to those who were destined to have no 
share in the gifts of the gods, and in the knowledge of the eternal Zeus." 27 

The testimony of the Apostolic Fathers means the original 
teaching of the apostles to their immediate pupils. This fur- 
nishes a connecting link in the historical succes- §218. witness 
sion of the Church from the apostles, who saw oftneFatn ers. 
Jesus ascending from the mount of Olives, up through that 
crystal fiery atmosphere of the Orient, until "a cloud re- 
ceived" and charioted him away into the invisible world This 

22 Bab. Tal. Sanhed. 98, a; on Dan. vii, 13; JTDt^ yj^-Oj^; also Sanhed. 96 b; 
comp. Matt, xxlv, 80; xxvl, 64. 

23 jjy 1 Chron. Hi, 24; Ber. Rab. Gen. xxviil, 10. 
s* Matt, xxvi, 64; comp. Luke xxii, 69. 

as Matt, xxii, 44; Mark xii, 36; Luke xx, 41-43; Acts ii, 35; Heb. i, 13. 
w Lard, vii, 494. ™ Neander, Church Hist, i, 173. 

20 



304 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

illustrates the universal faith, as it demonstrates the Christ 
exalted and glorified. The claim of the ascension originated 
in the event itself, and no question of the fact is recorded by 
friend or foe, that Jesus ascended into heaven. Upon the con- 
trary, much is affirmed by both classes to justify the claim. 

Barnabus (A. D. 70-79) : " "Wherefore also we keep the eighth day for 
rejoicing in which also Jesus rose from the dead, and having been 
manifested he ascended into the heavens." 28 

Polycarp (A. D. 155) : " For that ye have believed on Him that raised 
up our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, and gave him glory and a throne 
at his own right hand, unto whom all things were made subject, that 
are in heaven, and that are in earth, . . . who cometh as Judge of 
quick and dead/' 29 

To this patristic testimony is now to be added that of a dis- 
ciple of Polycarp, who was the disciple of the Apostle John who 
witnessed the Lord's ascension. There is but one intervening 
person in the line of teaching and current history of the fact, 
between John, the original witness of the ascending Christ, 
and Irenseus, who affirms and proclaims the universal faith of 
Christendom in the fact. Irenaeus (A. D. 177), then Bishop of 
Lyons affirmed : 

"The Church, though dispersed through the whole world, even to 
the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and their disciples 
this faith: [We believe] "In one God the Father Almighty, Maker of 
heaven and earth and of the sea and all things that are in them ; and in 
one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became incarnate for our salvation; 
and in the Holy Spirit, who proclaimed through the prophets the dispensa- 
tions of God, and the advents, and the birth of the virgin, and the passion, 
and of the resurrectiom of the dead, and the ascension into heaven in 

THE FLESH OF THE BELOVED CHRIST JeSTJS OUR LORD ; AND HIS MANI- 
FESTATION FROM HEAVEN IN THE GLORY OF THE FATHER," 30 etc. 

Aristides (A. D. 123) says : "This is taught from the Gospel which 

a little while ago was spoken among them as preached, 

§219. Wit- w h ere j n if ye will also read ye will comprehend the 

nessofthe ■ T ., "„ , . -, , 

Apologists, power that is upon it. . . . He was also pierced by 

the Jews, and died, and was buried ; and they say that after 
three days he rose and ascended ; and then these twelve disciples went 
forth into the known parts of the world, and taught his greatness with 
all humility and sobriety." 

as Bar. Epistle, c. 15. »Poly. Epis. to Philipp. c. 2. 

30 ire w. vs. Heresies, B. 1, c. 10. 



The Ascension of Jesus Christ. 305 

The newly-found Apology of Aristides contains also most 
of the "Apostles' Creed." The omissions are indicated by 
stars. It reads: 31 

" We believe in one God Almighty, 
Maker of heaven and earth, 
And in Jesus Christ his Son, 

***** 

Born of the Virgin Mary. 

* * * * * 

He was pierced by the Jews, 

He died and was buried, 

And the third day He rose again ; 

He ascended into heaven. 

* •£- * * * 

He is about to come to judge/' 

Justin Martyr (A. D. 145) : "After you had crucified him, the only 
blameless and righteous Man, . . . when you knew that he had risen 
from the dead and ascended to heaven, as the prophets foretold he would, 
you not only did not repent of the wickedness which you had com- 
mitted," 32 etc. 

Melito (A. D. 170) wrote the Confession of the period in 
his treatise on Faith, in the newly-discovered Syrian docu- 
ment, which is in the British Museum. 

" We have made collections from the Law and the Prophets relative 
to those things which have been declared respecting our Lord Jesus Christ, 
. . . who was incarnate in the Virgin, who was born in Bethlehem, . . . 
who was pointed out by John [Baptist] , who assembled the apostles, . . . 
who was hanged on the tree, who was buried in the earth, who rose from 
the dead, who appeared to the apostles, who ascended to heaven, who sitteth 
at the right hand of the Father, . . . who is God, the Son who is the 
Father, Jesus Christ the King for ever and ever. Amen." 33 

Tertullian (A. D. 200), in his wonderfully able and eloquent 

Apology, says: 

"He spent forty days with some of his disciples down in Galilee, 
. . . instructing them in the doctrines which they were to teach others. 
Therefore, having given them commission to preach the gospel through 
the world, he was encompassed with a cloud and taken up to heaven. ,,M 

31 Apology, 25 . M Dialogue with Trypho, 17. 

as Cited in West. Canon of N. T. 224-226. ^Apol. c. 21. 



306 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

The universal consensus of negative critics admits, as gen_ 

uine and credible, Paul's first four Epistles and John's Book 

mmm of Revelation. The testimony of these apostles 

§220. The Wit- , . 

ness of is not that they saw Jesus in the act of ascend- 

Paul and. John. . i, j. xi x t_ t • i £ x 

mg, but that he was seen alive m heaven — a fact 
which necessitates the induction that the Lord had first liter- 
ally ascended thither, as the Gospels record. 
a) Paul says : 

" As I made my journey and drew nigh unto Damascus, about noon, 
suddenly there shone from heaven a great light round about me. And I 
fell to the ground, and heard a voice saying unto me, Saul, Saul, why 
persecutest thou me? And I answered, Who art thou, Lord? And he 
said unto me, I am Jesus of Nazareth whom thou persecutest." " " Have 
I not seen Jesus our Lord ?" m " And last of all, as unto one born out of 
due time, he appeared unto me also." 37 "Say not in thy heart, Who 
shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down) : or Who shall 
descend into the abyss ? (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead)." 3 8 
"For to this end Christ died, and lived again, that he might be Lord of 
both the dead and the living." 39 "It was Christ Jesus that died, yea, 
rather, that was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God, 
who also maketh intercession for us." 40 

P) John, the apostle of Jesus, gives this witness in the first 

chapter of the Apocalypse : 

" Grace to you . . . from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful Wit- 
ness, the Firstborn of the dead, and Euler of the kings of the earth. 
. . . Behold, he cometh with the clouds, and every eye shall see him 
and they that pierced him ; and all the tribes of the earth shall mourn 
over him. Even so, Amen. I am the Alpha and the Omega, saith the 
Lord God, who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty." 
" Fear not ; I am the First and the Last, and the Living One ; and I was 
dead, and behold, I am alive for evermore ; and I have the keys of death 
and Hades. Write therefore the things which thou sawest." ** 

§221. Analysis of the Evidence Adduced. 

The chief evidence here adduced is twofold, — to substan- 
tiate the fact of Christ's literal ascension to, and spiritual 
royalty in heaven, as well as the peculiar manner of his second 

35 Acts xxii, 6-8. 36 1 Cor. ix, 1. * lb. xv, 8. 

as Rom. x. 6, 7. 39 lb. xiv, 9. 

» lb. viii, 34; comp. Eph. i, 20; Col. iii, 1; 1 Pet. ill, 22; Heb. i, 3; ix, 24; viii, 1; 
x, 12; xii, 2. 

« Rev. i, 4, 5, 7, 8, 17-19. 



The Ascension of Jesus Christ. 307 

advent to earth at the end of time, as the Scriptures affirm. The 
testimony is furnished alike by the adversaries and the adherents 
to Christianity. Of the enemies of the Christian religion 
there are two camps — the Jews and the Komans. Both were 
instinct with opposition which arises from the natural man. 
But their hostility was due to different motives. The Jews 
were characteristically malignant and persistent in their oppo- 
sition to the Man of Nazareth, for the same spirit which had 
originally crucified his person was transmitted and tradition- 
ally taught to childhood both in the home and in the syna- 
gogue. But the Koman hostility arose partly from the hate 
and scorn which the Romans cherished toward all Jews, of 
whose blood and nation the apostles and the first Christians 
were ; but more especially from what they regarded as consid- 
erations of patriotism, in that Christianity absolutely rejected 
and contemned all the Roman gods and the religion of the 
State. 

It is quite natural, therefore, that the testimony of both 
parties to the Christian facts, if recorded at all, should be no 
more copious or cordial than a brief reference to given circum- 
stances. It is to be noted, however, that neither the Jewish 
Rabbins nor the heathen Romans claim to have been personal 
witnesses of the ascension of Jesus Christ. The Jews testify 
that our Lord's ascension and his eternal royalty at the right 
hand of power were predicted by Christ himself, as well as 
his return to earth for judgment, " coming with the clouds of 
heaven," and so far they authenticate the words of Jesus as 
truly recorded in the Scriptures. But the Roman writers 
steadfastly affirm the ascension to have actually occurred. 
Upon the contrary, there is no known dissent respecting this 
occurrence. Now, if these enemies did not themselves see 
Jesus ascend from earth, their testimony does powerfully 
corroborate, in the historical sense, the witness of the apostles 
who did see him ascending in bodily form until "a cloud 
received him out of their sight." Why is it necessary that a 



308 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

literary writer of reputation should be a personal witness of 
the events of which he is cognizant in current history, any 
more than the historian who constantly records events which 
he has never seen? Nay, how much more is to be received 
the testimony of those who were confessedly hostile to the 
Christian religion, and wrote to destroy it? 

The rabbinical writers were particularly careful to record 
scant acknowledgment of anything that would seem to justify 
the Messianic character and claim of the Nazarene. But they 
own that "Jesus did predict his own ascension to heaven;" 
and that he appropriated to himself certain Psalms which the 
whole Jewish Church had always applied exclusively to the 
real Messiah. The evangelistic story states that the angel 
declared to the apostles at the ascension : " This same Jesus 
who is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like 
manner as ye have seen him go into heaven;" that as "a cloud 
[then] received him out of their sight," so will he return to 
earth encompassed " with the clouds of heaven." To Caiaphas 
and the Sanhedrists assembled to try Jesus, the Lord openly 
confessed that he was in truth the Son of God who would sit 
at the right hand of power, and would be seen of them there- 
after returning to the earth amidst the clouds of heaven. The 
Jewish Talmud thence records Jesus idiomatically and ironic- 
ally as "the son of the clouds" and as "the son of man coming in 
the clouds of heaven" The Targum applies the appellation 
" clouds " to the Messiah exclusively. This indirect testimony 
by the Jewish writers is not without its evidential value. It 
not only admits Christ's historical existence, but, what is of 
much importance, it records his own claim as being their 
Messiah; their testimony consents to the fact that "he pre- 
dicted his own ascension to heaven," and circumstantially 
describes that he will come again in the end as he went, 
encompassed with clouds. 

Turning to the Komans, we find none of those idiomatic 
and figurative representations characteristic of the Jews' ex- 






The Ascension of Jesus Cheist. 30^ 

pression, but we have the literal affirmations of the ascended 
Lord. Both Hierocles and Porphyry acknowledge outright 
that " Jesus ascended to heaven" Now, this conviction of the 
fact so thoroughly profound, entertained alike by foes and 
friends of Christ, remains to be explained, if the ascension 
did not actually occur to give it origin. It has ever been the 
universal belief of Christians, who hold the record of the 
fact. What produced this constant belief of friends and foes? 
If the occurrence is denied as being unhistorical, a satisfactory 
account of its origin without any fictitious assumptions is 
demanded of the disbeliever. For these heathen writers affirm 
the fact exactly accordant with the evangelistic narrative; 
accordant with the testimony of Stephen before the Sanhe- 
drists, when he attested that he saw Jesus standing at the right 
hand of God ; and accordant with the testimony of Paul, who 
affirmed that near Damascus he saw and talked with the 
ascended Jesus; and accordant with the testimony of John, 
who also attests that he saw Jesus on the Lord's day on the 
island Patmos. Such, then, is the apostolic teaching. The 
Johannean testimony carries this added force and effect : that 
John was himself present and personally witnessed the scene 
and circumstances when Jesus ascended ; so afterward, when 
John was exiled in Patmos, he recognized the personality of 
him who announced himself as "the Alpha and Omega, the 
First and the Last, and the Living One, who was dead, and 
behold I am alive for evermore" "Behold he cometh with the 
clouds, and every eye shall see him, and they that pierced him." 
To render this catenate of proofs complete and indisputa- 
ble touching the ascension, the witness of the Apostolic Fathers 
is introduced, supported by their successors the Christian 
Apologists. These several testimonies evidence and illustrate 
what was "the faith once delivered to the saints" by those 
who were eye-witnesses of Christ's exhaltation to glory. For 
if he was seen in heaven by Paul and John, as they affirm, he 
must first have ascended to heaven. The authenticity of this 



310 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

great doctrinal fact in its simplicity and sublimity, is thus 
brought to view apart from all fictitious pretense of legendary 
accretions, and was the universal faith of the Christian Church 
from the beginning. The sequel, then, of Christ's resurrection 
was his ascension. He was thereby inducted to royalty and 
enthroned. And herein is the circle of his activities in the 
interests of mankind, in both place and power, made complete 
when he shall come to earth, encompassed with clouds, as 
when he ascended. It is now easy to understand the facts 
as real, and the proofs as conclusive and historical, relating to 
these two events leading from the sepulcher to the throne — 
from deepest humility to greatest royalty. These two facts 
are basal to the whole system of Christian doctrine. 

The Creeds of the Church are but the crystalline expression 

of Christian beliefs. They summarize the principal facts and 

S222 doctrines of the primitive Church. As indicative 

creeds. f the apostles' faith and teaching — though not 

formulated until some time after the Apostolic Age — it may 

be deemed in place to cite here 

THE APOSTLES' CREED. 
" I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth ; and 
in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord ; who was conceived by the 
Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary; suffered under Pontius 
Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried. He descended into Hades. 
The third day he rose from the dead ; he ascended into heaven, and 
sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty ; from thence 
he will come to judge the quick and the dead. I believe in the 
Holy Ghost ; the holy catholic Church, the communion of Saints ; 
the forgiveness of sins ; the resurrection of the body ; and the life 
everlasting. Amen." 

The reality of the great fact discussed in this chapter, 
besides verifying inductively the antiquity and authenticity of 
the New Testament, legitimates the following conclusions : 

1. The ascension of Christ occurred visibly at the Mount of 

Olives. 

2. This was the transitional period in his life between two 

worlds. 



The Ascension of Jesus Christ. 311 

3. Christ's ascension inducted him to his proper place of 

royalty. 

4. The risen and ascended Christ identifies him as the Lord 

of Glory. 

5. His ascension to heaven forecasts his return as the Judge 

of men. 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE APOSTLES OF JESUS CHKIST AND 
THEIR WORK. 

I. Historicity op the People Called Christians. 

1. Appellative "Christians" Applied First by the 

World. 

2. Attested by the Common Literature of the Period. 

II. Historical Existence op Christ's Disciples. 

1. Attested by the Enemies of Christianity. 

2. Confirmed by the Friends of Christianity. 

3. Analysis of the Several Testimonies Given. 

III. James, the Lord's Brother, also an Apostle. 

1. Several Persons Named James in the New Testa- 

ment. 

2. James the Brother of Our Lord. 

a) His Noble Character. 
jS) His Violent Death. 

3. The Several Testimonies Ke vie wed. 

IV. Miracles Wrought by the Apostles op Christ. 

1. Miracles as Accrediting Signs of Apostleship. 

2. Miracles Manifold Wrought in Christ's Name. 

3. Miracles Admitted by Foes with Explanations. 

V. The Apostles' Ministry Abroad Among the Nations. 

1. The Common Voice of Disbelief Confirmed. 

2. Christianity in Relation to the Roman Empire. 

3. Cities and Centers Reached by the Apostles' Min- 

istry. 

4. Obstacles and Oppositions to the Diffusion of Re- 

ligion. 

Inductions. 
313 



Chapter XII. 

THE APOSTLES OF JESUS CHKIST A1STD 
THEIK WOKK. 

§223. The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 

And the disciples were called Christians first at Antioch [Syria]. — Luke. 

Nero . . . falsely charged with the guilt . . . the persons com- 
monly called Christians. Christ, the founder of that name, had 
been put to death. — Tacitus. 

And the sect of Christians, so named from Him, are not extinct at this 
day. — Josephus. 

James, called the brother of our Lord, because he is called the son of 
Joseph. — Eusebius. 

Ananus . . . assembled the Sanhedrin of the Judges, and brought 
before them the brother of Jesus who was called Christ, whose 
name was James. — Josephus. 

Go ye therefore, disciple all nations, . . . teaching them to observe 
all things whatsoever I commanded you. — Jesus. 

And they went forth and preached everywhere, the Lord working with 
them, confirming the word by the signs following. — Mark. 

ARGUMENT. 

A principal fact in the Gospels is that Jesus Christ attracted to his 
person and ministry many disciples, who were afterward called 
apostles, to whom, in the first instance, was due the spread of the 
Christian religion. The enemies of Christianity either admit or 
affirm the discipleship to have been historical. Accordant with 
Jewish custom, the names of certain disciples are mentioned. 
Some adversaries refer to one " James, the brother of Jesus who 
was called Christ." It is quite certain that this James was not 
one of the original twelve disciples of Christ, but that he became 
an apostle by reason of the Lord's resurrection. All parties 
ascribe to James a pure and upright character. He died a martyr 
for his Christian faith. 

The followers of Christ were early called Christians after his name. The 
disciples afterwards were designated apostles with reference to 
their great commission in being sent forth to the nations by Christ 
to preach his gospel. Having been invested with power from on 

315 



316 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

high at the great Pentecost, they began the work of their apostolate, 
first in Judaea, but afterward among the populations, civilizations, 
and great centers of the Roman Empire. Wherever they went, 
they published the saving power of Jesus Christ, and they wrought 
miracles in his name. The apostles and their successors met with 
an amazing success — a success which is not to be explained on any 
natural principles. 

1. The Followers of Christ, from His name, were called 

Christians. 

2. The Historical Existence of Persons known as Christ's 

Disciples. 

3. James, who was the Brother of our Lord, also became 

His Apostle. 

4. These Apostles wrought Miracles by the Name and 

Power of Christ. 

5. They also went to the Nations, publishing His Gospel 

with Success. 

I. Christ's Followers Called Christians. 
The Book of Acts records that "the disciples were called 
Christians first at Antioch." The designation 

§224. The ° 

Appellative had special reference to Christ, the Founder of 

the Christian religion. It was the remark of 

Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria : 

"The Christian people never took their denomination from their 
own bishops, but from the Lord in whom we believe. And though the 
blessed apostles are our masters, and have administered to us the gospel 
of our Lord, we are not named from them. For from Christ we are, and 
are called Christians." 1 

From the circumstance that the word Christian is derived 
from a Greek stem with a Latin termination, it is supposed 
that the appellation was of Eoman origin, and was not 
assumed by the apostles in the first instance. Nevertheless, 
because of its reference to Christ, it was not unacceptable. 
Paul seems to have avoided its use altogether, even in the 
famous defense of his faith at Caesarea, when Herod Agrippa 
II pronounced the name " Christian," perhaps sneeringly, and 
the apostle responded with such impressive dignity and cour- 
tesy to the king. Peter, however, employed the term with 
reference to its origin when he wrote : 

i Lard, iv, 153. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 317 

"If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye ; . . . 
but let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evil doer, 
or as a meddler in other men's matters. Yet if any one suffer as a 
Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name." 2 

The appellation seems to have been in common use by foes 
and friends for a period of two centuries after the apostles. 
Josephus says that "the sect of Christians, so § 225. common 
named from Him, are not extinct at this day." 3 in Literature. 
Tacitus mentions "Christ the founder of that name," and 
declares that Eero "falsely charged with the guilt [of himself 
in burning Eome] those persons . . . commonly called 
Christians." 4 Pliny the younger, in his official Letter to 
Trajan, speaks of the judicial "trials of the Christians" 
who were "brought before him as Christians." He says: 
"I asked them whether they were Christians;" some "con- 
fessed that they were Christians, but others denied it." 5 
Suetonius, also referring to the burning of Rome, says of Nero 
that "he likewise inflicted punishments on the Christians."* 
Celsus speaks of the first Jewish Christians as "deserters to 
another name, and another mode of life." 6 Lucian, mentioning 
one Peregrinus, says : "At which time he learned the wonderful 
doctrines of the Christians." 7 Porphyry refers to Origen, who 
" was in great esteem, . . . whose authority is very great 
with the teachers of this [new] doctrine, . . . who went 
over to this barbarian temerity, . . . living as a Christian, 
and contrary to the laws." 8 Aristides says : " Those who to-day 
believe in his preaching are called Christians, who are well 
known." 9 Tertullian says : " The outcry is that the State is 
filled with Christians; they are in the fields, in the citadels, in 
the islands. They make lamentation as for some calamity, 
that both sexes, every age and condition, even high rank, are 
passing over to the profession of the Christian faith." 10 

* Lives of the Ccesars, Nero, c. 16. 

2 1 Pet. iv, 14, 16. 3 Ant. xviii, 8, 3. * Annals, xv, 44, 45. 

6 Epis. x, 97. 6 Orig. con. Cels. 11, 1. 1 Cited by Lard, vii, 279. 

a lb. p. 397. 9 Apology. io Apol. c. 1. 



318 Historical Evidence of the JSTew Testament. 

This common usage in the current literature of those times 
proves the early origin of Christianity, and the authenticity of 
the references to Christians made by Luke and Peter. 

II. Historical Existence of the Disciples. 

In ancient times it was usual for philosophers and teachers 
to have a following of those who were attracted to their pres- 
ence for the purpose of receiving instruction, 
cipies of Socrates and Plato had their learners ; John Bap- 
tist and Jesus had their disciples. After having 
spent a night in prayer, our Lord chose twelve men 11 whom he 
ordained to be the companions of his ministry, the witnesses of 
his miracles, and the learners of his doctrines. "With such ample 
opportunities and advantages they were to be qualified to attest 
his own resurrection from the dead, his ascension to heaven, as 
well as to write the memoirs of his life, and then preach his 
gospel to the nations of the world. A disciple was a follower 
of Jesus; an apostle was one sent to publish salvation in his 
name unto all people. These chosen twelve disciples after- 
wards became his commissioned apostles. Of these twelve, 
however, "Judas by transgression fell," and one Matthias was 
chosen to take his place in the apostolate. Thenceforth the 
superstructure of Christianity was " built upon the foundation 
of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the 
chief corner-stone." * 

Now, those writers who were hostile to the Christian relig- 
ion made a record which strongly confirms the history of the 
- a P os t°l a te of Jesus as given in the historical part 
ords of the of the New Testament. They recognize and 
affirm the fact that our Lord did ordain and send 
forth his apostles to preach Christ's saving power. 

1. Josephus mentions the broad fact of Christ's following : 
" He drew after him many of the Jews and many of the Greeks. " u 

*Eph.ii, 20; 1 Pet. ii, 6. 

ii Matt, x, 2-5; Mark iii, 14; Luke vi, 13-16; John vi, 70, 71; Acts 1, 18. 

u Ant. xvili, 3,3. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Theik Work. 319 



2. The Talmud mentions some of the disciples' names : 

"The Rabbins have taught that there were five disciples of Jesus : 
Matthai [i. e., Matthew], Thodah [Thaddeus], Nestor [Nazarene], Boni 
or Nikdimon ben Gorion [Nicodemus son of Gorion], and Nakai," either 
an unknown follower, or a fictitious name of a disciple. " Eleazor says : 
O Akiba, ... as I was walking in the street of Zipporis I met one of 
the disciples of Jesus of Nazareth whose name is James." 13 

3. The Toledoth Jeshu mentions the exact number and 
vocation of the disciples : 

" Jesus had twelve disciples, who traveled into the twelve kingdoms 
and prophesied of him. The people went after him, and some of them 
were reputable people, who confirmed the doctrine of Jeshu [Jesus], 
and they declared that they were his messengers." " They gathered a 
vast multitude of Israel," etc. 

4. Celsus mentions Christ's disciples and what he conceived 
to be their character : 

"Jesus having gathered around him ten or eleven persons of noto- 
rious character, the very wickedest of tax-gathers and sailors, 14 . . . 
those who were his associates while {he was] alive, and who listened to 
his voice and enjoyed his instruction as their teacher." 15 "They have for- 
saken the laws of their fathers in consequence of their minds being led 
captive by Jesus, . . . and they haver become deserters to another 
name and another mode of life." 16 "In the next place he was betrayed 
by [one of] those whom he called his disciples." 17 

5. Julian mentions the names of Christian converts who 
were reputable. Eef erring to Jesus and Paul, he says : 

"They never expected you [Christians] to arrive at such power. 
They were content with deceiving maidservants and slaves, and by them 
some men and women, such as Cornelius and Sergius. If there were 
other men of eminence brought over to you — I mean in the time of Tiberius 
and Claudius, when these things happened — let me pass for a liar in 
everything I say." M 

Respecting the apostles, there is abundant TneRec- 

confirmation in the literature of the Christians ordsof 

. Christians. 

belonging to the same period. 

Barnabas says: " And when he chose his own apostles, who were to 
proclaim his gospel, . . . then he manifested himself to be the Son 

™Bab. Tal., Sanhed. 43, a, Unexpurgated ed. m Cels. i, 62. 

«76.ii, 45, ™Ib. li, 1. "lb. 11,11. m Lard, vii, 630, 631. 

21 



320 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

of God. . . . They that preached unto us the forgiveness of sins and 
the purification of our heart, they to whom being twelve in number, for 
a testimony unto the twelve tribes — for there are twelve tribes of Israel — 
he gave authority over the gospel, that they should preach it." 19 Aris- 
tides says: "This Jesus . . . had twelve disciples, in order that a 
certain dispensation of his might be fulfilled. . . . He ascended [to 
heaven] , and then these twelve disciples went forth into the known parts 
of the world, and taught concerning his greatness." 20 Tertullian says: 
" He spent forty days with some of his disciples down in Galilee, a re- 
gion in Judaea, instructing them in the doctrines they were to teach 
others. Thereafter, having given them commission to preach the gospel 
through the world, . . . his disciples also spreading over the world, 
did as their Divine Master bade them." 21 The Apostle Paul says: 
"Neither went I up to Jerusalem to those that were apostles before 
me. . . . But other apostles saw I none save James the Lord's 
brother." " He was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve. . . . After 
that he was seen of James, then of all the apostles." 22 

An analysis of the foregoing testimonies yields 
Analysis of the following propositions confirmatory of facts 

Testimonies. ^ t . ,-, ^ -. 

affirmed m the Gospels : 

1. That Jesus attracted to himself many disciples, both Jews 

and Gentiles. (Josephus.) 

2. Some of the disciples of Christ are mentioned by name, by 

Jewish Eabbis. (Talmud.) 

3. Through these disciples a very great multitude of Israel 

became believers. (Toledo th.) 

4. The converts to Christianity went over to another name and 

mode of life. (Celsus.) 

5. The chronology of these facts dates in the reign of Tiberius 

and Claudius. (Julian.) 

CONFIRMATIONS 

6. Barnabas confirms Toledoth as to twelve disciples according 

to the twelve tribes. 

7. Aristides confirms Toledoth in the number and vocation of 

the apostles of Jesus. 

8. Tertullian confirms Paul of Christ's teaching in Galilee 

after his resurrection. 23 



is Epis. cc. 5, 8. 20 Apol. 21 Apol. c. 21. 

22 Gal. i, 17-19 : ii, 9 ; 1 Cor. xv, 5, 7. M Acts xlll, 31. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 321 

9. Julian confirms Toledoth as to reputable standing of some 

Christian converts. 

10. Paul confirms the Talmud in naming, and the Toledoth in 
numbering, the disciples. 

11. And all the testimonies witness to the antiquity and truth 
of the New Testament. 

III. James the Brother of Our Lord. 

Four persons of eminence are named James in the New 
Testament: "James the Elder," "James the §230 Four 
Little," "James the son of Alphaeus," and " James named James. 
the Lord's brother." 

James the Elder, was brother of the Apostle John, son of 
Zebedee. 24 These two were designated by Christ as "sons of 
thunder." * They both enjoyed special relations with Jesus in 
preparation for special services in their future apostolate. 
They, with Peter, were the favored three of the Twelve who 
were chosen to witness Christ's Messianic work when he raised 
the daughter of Jairus from the dead, * who were admitted to 
behold the glory of Christ's transfiguration "on the holy 
mount," 27 and who witnessed the Lord's humiliation and agony 
in the garden Gethsemane. * This James was the first martyr, 
as John was the last survivor, of the twelve disciples. He 
was beheaded by order of Herod Agrippa I, in A. D. 44. a 

James the Little, 30 probably so called from his stature, was 
the son of a certain Mary and a brother of Joseph. 31 His 
mother is named as one of the women from Galilee who 
brought sweet spices to the Savior's tomb. 32 This James is 
quite commonly supposed to be the son of Alphseus, on the 
hypothesis that his mother was the wife of Cleopas, who was 

2* Matt, iv, 21 ; x, 2. 25 Mark iii, 17. 26 Mark v, 37; Luke viil, 41, 49-55. 

27 Matt, xvii, 1-13; Mark ix, 2-10; Luke ix, 28-36; 2 Pet. i, 17, 18. 

28 Matt, xxvl, 36-46; John xviii, 1 ; xii, 27. 

29 Acts xii, 2 

30 '0 Mucp6?, the Little, not the Less, as in the A. V., Markxv, 40. 

31 Matt, xxvii, 56, Mapia 17 rod 'IaKW/Sou kclI 'I«<r>7 p.'qT'qp, 

32 Mark xvi, 1; coinp. xv, 40; Luke xxiii, 55, 56; xxiv, 1. 



322 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

also named Alphseus ; ^ but this is seriously questioned. Though 
a man of prominence in the primitive Church, he does not seem 
to have been one of the twelve apostles. 

James the son of Alphaeus, who was one of the original 
Twelve, and is named in the four apostolic lists. 34 

James, the Lord's brother, was the eldest of Joseph and 

Mary's children, Jesus being the firstborn of the Virgin. In 

the family list contained in the Gospels, the name 
§ 231. The J . m . 

Lord's of James is invariably mentioned first, denoting 

priority as to his brothers and unnamed sisters. 35 
It is a curious circumstance noted by the Evangelist that 
Christ's nearest kindred at first did not believe on him as the 
Messiah when engaging in his Messianic work. Upon the 
contrary, they regarded his claims thereto as merely so much 
evidence that Jesus was beside himself. * Quite probably the 
Lord referred to this fact when he said: "A prophet is not 
without honor, but in his own country, and among his own kin, 
and in his own house" 37 

This James is not mentioned in the four registries of the 
twelve disciples, ffl but appears to have become converted upon 
first seeing the risen Christ. In the records of the Lord's 
reappearances alive, no details are given as to his appearing to 
James, but the fact itself is clearly stated by Paul: "After 
that he was seen of James, then of all the apostles." 39 Subse- 
quently Paul, relating his visit to Jerusalem, recognizes the 
Lord's brother as an apostle, and holding a pre-eminent position 
in the Apostolic Church: "But other of the apostles saw I 
none save James the Lord's brother." m " And when James, 
Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars [in the Church], 
perceived the grace that was given unto me, they gave to me 

33 John xix, 25; comp. Matt, x, 3. 

34 Matt, x, 3; Mark iii, 13-19; Luke vi, 14-16; Acts i, 13. 

35 Matt, xiii, 55, 56; Mark vi, 3; John vi, 42. 

36 Mark iii, 21; Matt, xii, 46-50; John vii, 5. 

37 Mark vi, 3, 4; Luke iv, 24. 

38 Matt, x, 2; Mark iii, 14-19; Luke vi, 13-16; Acts i, 13. 
3» 1 Cor. xv, 7. 40 Gal, i, 19 ; ii, 9. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 323 

and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship, that we should go 
unto the heathen, and they unto the circumcision." fl James 
appears to have taken front rank with the apostles ; for he was 
chosen as the first Bishop of Jerusalem; 42 he was the presiding 
spirit in the first Council of the Church; 43 and he wrote an 
Epistle of the New Testament which bears his name and 
indicates his relationship to Jesus. How faithful he was after 
his conversion to Christ, how spiritual he was in his character 
and life; and how he finally won a martyr's crown, are 
things to be related in the testimonies to follow. 

The pre-eminent position of this James as given in the 
New Testament "justifies a reference to his charac- „ 00 ^ _ 

J §232. Charac- 

ter as indicated in the views of him entertained teroftne 

by those who lived in his times and succeeding. Brother. 

There are two sources, Jewish and Christian. 

The Talmud: "James was so eminent among the Jews that they 
designated him to be a mighty man [or, a leader of the people] ; and he 
wore a white garment, and drank no wine, and ate no meat, and never 
cut his hair, nor did he trim his beard." 

Hegesippus, a Christian historian, who wrote about A. D. 
170, is cited by Eusebius thus : 

"Hegesippus also, who flourished nearest the days of the apostles, in 
the Fifth Book of his Commentaries gives the most accurate account of 
him [i. e., of James the Just] thus: ' But James, the brother of the Lord, 
who, as there were many of this name, was surnamed the Just by all, 
from the days of our Lord until now, receiving the government of the 
Church with the apostles. This apostle was consecrated from his 
mother's womb. He drank neither wine nor fermented liquors, and 
abstained from animal food. A razor never came upon his head. . . . 
He alone was allowed to enter the sanctuary [of the priests]. He never 
wore woolen, but linen garments. He was in the habit of entering the 
temple alone, and was often found upon his bended knees, and interced- 
ing for the forgiveness of his people ; so that his knees became as hard 
as camels', in consequence of his habitual supplication and kneeling 
before God. And indeed, on account of his exceeding great piety, he 
was called the Just.' " ** 



« Gal. ii, 9. & Euseb. E. IT., B. ii, c. 1. « Acts xv, 13. 

« Euseb. E. H., B. ii, c. 23. 



324 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Clement of Rome, the companion of Paul, in the sixth book 
of the Institutions, attributed to him, says : 

Peter, James, and John, after the ascension of our Savior, though 
they had been preferred by our Lord, did not contend for the honor, 
but chose James the Just as Bishop of Jerusalem. . . . The Lord 
imparted the gift of knowledge to James the Just, to John and Peter, 
after his resurrection ; these delivered it to the rest, and they to the 
Seventy, of whom Barnabas was one." 45 

In the Constitutions of the Apostles, Clement gives the 
following declaration as being official from James the Lord's 
brother : 

"I James, the brother of Christ according to the flesh, but his 
servant as the only begotten of God, and the one appointed Bishop of 
Jerusalem," 46 etc. 

Eusebius says : 

" James being the first that received the dignity of the episcopate at 
Jerusalem from the Savior himself, as the sacred Scriptures show that he 
was generally called the brother of Christ." 47 

Dr. Philip Schaff, having cited some legendary works 
relating to the Lord's brother, says : 

" Legends gather around the memory of great men, and reveal the 
deep impression they made upon their friends and followers. The char- 
acter which shines through these James-legends is that of a loyal, 
zealous, devout, consistent Hebrew Christian, who, by his personal 
purity and holiness, secured the reverence and affection of all around 
him." ^ 

§ 233 Martyr- Josephus, referring to the year A. D. 63 as 

domoftne ^ e ^ate of James's death, mentions the Koman 

Lord's Brother. 

procurator of Judaea as 

" Festus [who] was now dead, and [his successor] Albinus was but 
upon the road [from Rome to Jerusalem to take his place]; so he 
[Ananus] assembled the Sanhedrin of Judges, and brought before them 
the brother of Jesus who was called Christ, whose name was James, 
and some others [companions] ; and when he had formed an accusation 
against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned. 

* Euseb. E. H. B. ii, c. 1. 

« Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. VII, B. viii. Constitution of Apostles, c. 35, p. 496. 

« Euseb. E. H., B. vii, c. 19. ^Ilist. Christ. Church, 1, 268, 269. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 325 

. . . "Whereupon [after his arrival] Albinus . . . wrote in anger 
to Ananus, and threatened that he would bring him to punishment for 
what he had done; upon which King Agrippa [the Second] took the 
high priesthood from him when he had ruled but three months." 49 

Clement of Rome : ' ' There were two Jameses ; one was called the 
Just, who was thrown from the wing of the temple, and beaten to death 
with a fuller's club; and another, who was beheaded" 60 in A. D. 44. 
See Acts xii, 1, 2. 

Hegesippus, as cited by Eusebius, narrates that the scribes 
and Pharisees came to James with very nattering words, and 
besought him, because of his great influence with the people, 
to use it in recalling them from their faith in Jesus. 

They "placed James upon a wing of the temple, and cried out: ' O 
thou just man, whom we all ought to believe, since the people are led 
astray after Jesus that was crucified, declare unto us, What is the 
door to Jesus that was crucified V And he answered with a loud voice : 
' Why do you ask me respecting Jesus the Son of man ? He is now 
sitting in the heavens on the right hand of Power, and will come on 
the clouds of heaven.' Then the people shouted, 'Hosanna to the son 
of David.' Thereupon they cast him down from the temple, saying, 
' Let us stone James the Just !' As he did not die immediately when 
cast down, but turning around, he knelt down saying: ' I entreat thee, 
O Lord God and Father, forgive them, they know not what they do !' 
Thus they were stoning him when one of the priests" interposed, and 
another brained him while he was praying for them. "Immediately 
after this Vespasian invaded and took Judaea." Eusebius here re- 
marks: " Such is the more simple testimony of Hegesippus, in which 
he fully coincides with Clement." 61 

Eusebius continues : " The Jews, after Paul had appealed unto 
Caesar, and he had been sent by Festus to Rome, frustrated by their 
hope of entrapping him by the snares they had laid, turned themselves 
against James, the brother of the Lord, to whom the Episcopal seat at 
Jerusalem was committed by the apostles . . . For Festus about 
this time died in Judaea, and the province [of Judaea] was without a 
governor or head. But as to the manner of James's death, it has been 
already stated in the words of Clement, that he was thrown from the wing 
of the temple, and beaten to death with a club." 62 . 

Origen, referring to the prediction of Christ concerning 

the destruction of Jerusalem, says : 

" It is recorded that: 'When ye see Jerusalem compassed about by 
armies, then shall ye know that the desolation thereof is nigh.' But at 

*»Ant. xx, 9, 1. ™Euseb. E. H., B. ii, c. 1. a lb. B, ii, c. 23. 

62 lb. B. ii, c. 23. 



326 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

that time there were no armies around Jerusalem, encompassing 
and inclosing and besieging it. For the siege began in the reign of 
Nero, and lasted till the government of Vespasian, whose son, Titus, 
destroyed Jerusalem, as Josephus says, on account of James the Just, 
brother of Jesus who was called Christ; but in reality, as the truth 
makes clear, on account of Jesus the Son of God." 53 

§234 The The evidential worth of these testimonies is 
ReviewedT verv considerable in substantiating the historical 
existence and antiquity of Jesus and James. 

1. Whether James was by blood the half-brother of 
Jesus, and next to him in birth, is not the purpose of this dis- 
cussion. It is sufficient to prove the historicity of the case 
that James was in any sense a close relative of Jesus, though 
" called James, the Lord's brother." For it is obvious that if 
there was no historical Christ, no one could be called the 
brother of Christ. Josephus names " James, the brother of 
Jesus who is called Christ." James, in an episcopal document, 
designates himself as " James, the brother of Christ according 
to the flesh." Paul affirms that he saw at Jerusalem with 
Peter, "James, the Lord's brother." Eusebius mentions 
" James, the brother of the Lord, who was generally called 
the brother of Christ." Clement, who agrees with Hegesip- 
pus in all details of his death, calls him " James the Just." 
Hegesippus speaks of " James, the brother of the Lord, who 
was surnamed the Just by all." Origen, citing Josephus, 
mentions " James the Just, the brother of Jesus who was called 
Christ." 

Now, this constant identification and characterization of 
the same persons, in the current literature of different persons, 
in different ages, in different countries, these designations can 
not be accidental coincidents, can not be applied to fictitious 
personages, can not be unhistorical ; for more decisive language 
could not be used when it was the intention to convey the 
thought that Jesus and James were brothers by blood, having 



w Orig. contra Cels. ii, 13, close, and Luke xxi, 20. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 327 

the same mother. It thus appears that not only Jesus was 
knovm as the Man of History ', but his family relations were 
also known and named, herein unmistakably confirming the 
Evangelists. 

2. The historical antiquity and chronology of the apos- 
tolate are also conclusively proved by these testimonies. Two 
distinct references are made to the death of James, which fix 
the date of its occurrence quite definitely. Josephus makes 
express allusion to Ananus the younger, who is said to have 
illegimately assumed the high priesthood after the death of 
the procurator Festus, and then proceeded to instigate the 
martyrdom of James by stoning. For this procedure he was 
threatened with punishment by the new procurator on his 
arrival, and King Agrippa II, who was charged with the 
temple and its interests, deposed Ananus at the end of three 
months from his assumption of the priestly robes. There was 
considerable of an interval in the Roman procuratorship over 
Judaea, between the ruling of the Jews by Festus who had died, 
and that of his successor, Albinus, before his arrival. It was 
during this interval, when the country was without a Roman 
ruler, that James the Just was slain. This occurred in the 
year 63, 51 or soon after. Eusebius mentions the event briefly: 
"Festus about this time died in Judaea, and the province was 
without a governor or head," and that already "Paul had 
appealed to Caesar." Hegesippus places the date of James's 
death somewhat later. He says : " Immediately after this 
[*. e. James's death] Yespasian invaded and took Judaea." Now, 
this invasion actually occurred in the year 67. ^ The Emperor 
Nero ordered the invasion and conquest of the Jews. But 
Nero died in 68, when Yespasian being then in Palestine, 
and hearing of the emperor's death, the soldiers of his com- 
mand at once proclaimed Yespasian emperor ; whereupon he 
handed over his military forces to his son Titus. 

54 Schaff, Hist. Christ. Ch. i, 267. ^Ib. i, 395. 



328 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



TV. Miracles Wrought in Christ's Name. 
The apostles, going before the nations in their high commis- 
sion from Christ, required miraculous credentials to be success- 
ful. The world was a bulwark of idolatries, but- 

§ 235. Mira- ' 

cies in tressed on every side against the invasion of any 
eman . new religion. The religion of a revered ancestry 
dominated and was to be defended at all hazards. A deep 
and persistent prejudice was permanently inwrought by 
tradition and education. But that which made the enterprise 
the more formidable and dangerous was, that idolatory 
was the chosen religion of the Koman Empire, and was 
so incorporated into the constitution and laws of government 
that the very proposition which Christianity had to offer was 
held to be high treason against the State. The established 
policy of the empire, of which the emperor in person was 
chief pontiff, the civil officers of the several provinces 
abroad, the armies and their commanders everywhere, were 
committed against that which they all jealously regarded as a 
criminal invasion of the government. Upon the other hand, 
the Christian religion was without a friend at the court. It 
had not even the sanction of an earlier antiquity to render it 
respectable in their eyes, or the sanctity of an ancestral wor- 
ship to make it acceptable. It had no nation at its back to 
enforce its claims or to protect its subjects. Unlike Moham- 
med's movement, it had neither arms nor armies to invade 
and make conquest of whole communities, or States or nations, 
by force. It had an incomparably better mission; but it 
was purely a mission of peace. Its only method was that of 
persuasion ; was an appeal to the personal conscience for con- 
viction in the direction of right doing, and to the resulting 
consciousness of supreme satisfactions in a nobler life. But 
to secure attention at all, anywhere and everywhere, the 
first advocates of the new religion must produce evidence 
of advantages superior to those already possessed. They 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 329 

must come invested with a divine power, known not 
only to themselves, but with an ability to make known 
their supreme claims by supernatural signs and wonders cor- 
responding, in order to obtain a hearing and produce convic- 
tion. How could the apostles possibly succeed except they 
illustrate, in some benevolent way, the exercise of some 
supernatural power which belonged to their cause, and not to 
themselves ? And how could that manifestation of power be 
made effectual in impression otherwise than in the instantane- 
ous working of miracles in the name of their high authority ? 
Accordingly miracles were at once the credentials of the 
apostles, commending their mission to the world, and the 
attestation of the supreme authority and the supernatural 
religion of Christ in his relation to the world. 

A study of the facts associated with the founding of the 
Christian religion embraces the history of miracles as con- 
tained in the New Testament. It is to be 

§ 236 Miracles 

specially noted that those wrought by the apos- in Christ's 
ties were wrought in Christ's name, and by the 
power with which he had invested them. * They expressly 
disclaimed producing miracles by their own power. They 
were wrought in the direction of beneficence. Jesus had 
carefully prepared their minds for this responsibility when he 
said to them : " He that belie veth on me, the works that I do 
shall he do also, and greater works than these shall he do." 56 
To this end, he charged them to tarry in Jerusalem until 
they received the investiture of power, having the promise that 
the Holy Spirit should come upon them, and then would they 
be qualified to bear witness for him unto the uttermost parts 
of the earth. 57 

Sometimes these miracles are recorded in general terms, 



-See $ 143. y ). As the general subject of miracles has been already trav- 
ersed in three prior chapters of this work, only those which were peculiarly 
the apostles' will be considered here. 

66 John xiv, 12. w Luke xxiv, 49; Acts, i, 4, 8. 



330 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

and sometimes they are ascribed to individual apostles named. 
Sometimes the account of a given miracle embraces specific 
details and sometimes very many miracles are massed in one 
§ 237. Miracles general statement. After the pentecostal man- 
Manifoid. ifestations were realized, "many wonders and 
signs were done by the apostles." " They were wonderful for 
numbers, and for the insignificance of the means employed. 

" Many signs and wonders were wrought among the people, . . . 
insomuch that they brought forth the sick into the streets, and laid 
them on beds and couches, that at least the shadow of Peter passing by, 
might overshadow some one of them. There came also a multitude from 
the cities round about Jerusalem, bringing sick folk and them that were 
vexed with unclean spirits; and they were healed every one/' 59 "And 
God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul, so that from his 
body were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs or aprons ; and the 
diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out of them." 60 

"To the Corinthian Church which Paul had planted, he 
wrote from Macedonia about the year 57: "Truly the signs 
of the apostle were wrought among you in all patience, by 
signs and wonders and mighty works." 61 

The interesting and valuable fact may here be recalled, that 

while the enemies of Christianity for the first four centuries 

~ ~ ^ , did not deny the occurrence of miracles, they 

§238. Explana- J ' J 

tionof the admitted wonderful things did happen by the 
hands of the apostles, which they felt that they 
must explain. In a word, they endeavored to explain the 
miracles wrought in their times by ascribing them to magic 
or sorcery. It is, however, stated by an unknown Arabic 
writer, who seems to have been a philosopher, that, " in the 
practice of virtue, they [the apostles] surpass the philosophers • 
. . . in the genuine performance of miracles, they infinitely 
excel them." 62 Celsus asserts that " it is by the names of demons 
and by the use of incantations that the Christians appear to 
be possessed of [miraculous] power." 63 Porphyry calls the 

68 Acts ii, 43. ™ lb. v, 12, 15, 16. «° lb. xix, 11, 12. « 2 Cor. xli, 12. 

62 See "Galen," in Smith and Wace's Diet, of Christ. Biography. 
63 Orig. con. Cels. i, 6. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 331 

apostles "ignorant and indigent men [who], because they had 
nothing, performed some signs by magical art, which is no 
great matter, for the magicians in Egypt, and many others, 
have wrought signs. Let it be granted that the apostles 
wrought signs." 64 Julian the emperor wrote that the Chris- 
tians " have introduced a body of wonderful works, to give it 
the appearance of truth. . . . Paul also exceeded all jug- 
glers and impostors that ever were." m 
The Talmud relates that of miracles — 

"There is an example in the son of Dama, nephew of R. Ismael, by 
his sister. When he had been bitten by a serpent, James of Schechania 
came to heal him. But Rabbi Ismael did not allow it to be done. The 
son of Dama said to R. Ismael: ' O Rabbi Ismael, my uncle, let me be 
healed by him. I will allege a text out of the Law which allows it.' 
But before he had finished all he would say, he expired. Thereupon 
Ismael pronounced this speech over him: 'Thou art happy, O son of 
Dama ; for thy body has remained pure, and thy soul has gone pure out 
of it ; and thou hast not transgressed the words of thy brethren.' " 66 

The Talmud of Jerusalem affirms : 

"A child of the son of Rabbi Joses, son of Levi, swallowed a some- 
what poisonous. There came a man who pronounced some words to 
him, in the name of Jesus, . . . and he was healed. And when he 
was going away, R. Joses said unto him, 'What word did you use?' 
He answered, such a word. R. Joses said unto him : ' Better had it been 
for him to die than to hear such a word.' And so it happened ; that is, 
he died at once!" 67 

The first of these two Talmudic testimonies is inserted 
here as illustrative of the power of the early Christians to 
work miracles, and no less the gracious design to be a blessing 
to their Jewish enemies ; and upon the other hand, the ungra- 
cious and vindictive spirit in which their efforts of love were 
received, that death was preferred to life saved by a Christian 
miracle. As nothing is known of the home residence of either 
James, no opinion can be formed as to which James, if either 
is here referred to. In the second case, there is manifested 
the same old hatred to Jesus Christ, in whose name the mira- 
cles were wrought, carried to the same extreme. But thus 

e* Lard, vii, 442. «5 j&. 622. 

66 Tal. Jerus. Avoda, Sara 40, d. fol. 27, col. 2, med. 

67 lb. Tr. Sabbat. Pugio Fidei, p. 170. 



332 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

were they taught, and so did they feel, as furnished by their 

Kabbis, in the work which they hold as their highest authority, 

their Talmud. 

To these Jewish testimonies may be added that of the 

modern Jewish historian, Dr. Heinrich Graetz, professor in the 

University of Breslau, Prussia, who says : 

" Christianity, only just born, went forth upon a career of conquest 
and proselytism. The disciples asserted that Jesus had imparted the 
power of healing the sick, of awaking the dead, and of casting out evil 
spirits. With them the practice of exorcism became habitual, and thus 
the belief in the power of Satan and demons, brought from Galilee, first 
took form and root. . . . The early Christians used, or rather moused, 
the name of Jesus, for the purposes of incantation . . . Exorcism 
by degrees became a constant practice among the Christians/' 68 

In corroboration of the foregoing testimonies relating to 

miraculous power and work on the part of the apostles and 

§239. origen their successors, the recorded testimony of Ori- 

connrms. g en respecting miracles wrought in his own time 

is now due. Origen wrote about A. D. 240-245. He says: 

"We, if we deem this a matter of importance, can clearly show a 
countless multitude of Greeks and Barbarians who acknowledge the 
existence of Jesus. And some give evidence of having received, through 
this faith, a marvelous power by the cures which they perform, invoking 
no other name over those who need their help than that of the God of 
all things, and of Jesus, along with the mention of his history. For by 
these means we, too, have seen many persons freed from grievous calamities, 
and from distractions of mind, and madness, and countless other ills, which 
could be cured neither by men nor devils. 7 ' 69 

Here are admissions of the miraculous power exercised by 
the early Christians for curing fatal diseases, "the power of 
healing the sick, awaking the dead, and casting 
out demons ;" " a constant practice among the 
Christians " at that time. But in explanation, the adversaries 
superstitiously attribute these works to "incantation" or to 
"the belief in the power of Satan." 70 The curious question 
arises, "Why this preference as to the source of power ? Ees- 

68 Hist, of the Jews, Vol. I, p. 170. 69 Orig. contra Cels. iii, 24. 

to Matt, ix, 32, 34; xil, 22, 30; Mark iii, 22, 30. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 333 

cuing the poisoned by a word, "healing the sick, awaking the 
dead, and casting out demons," are pure miracles in fact, 
though called by any other name. It is the same old charge 
which Jesus refuted when his opposers ascribed the miracles 
which he himself wrought to Satan. Miracles were helpful 
to the ministry of the apostles and their successors in opening 
the new epoch known as the Christian era; and when they 
had done their work for the world, they were retired. The 
evidence of experience and Christian consciousness replaced 
the external evidence of miracles. This was the deeper, 
because the internal proof of the Christian religion, precisely 
where all other religions fail ; ultimate, because it was personal 
affecting the character and the life of the individual believing 
in Christ. 

Y. Ministry of the Apostles to the Nations. 
The student of the ISTew Testament will readily recall 
Christ's commission intrusted to his apostles: "Go ye there- 
fore and make disciples of all nations." "And 

r §241. Ministry 

they went forth and preached everywhere, the of the Apostles 

x t -. . .,■* ,1 -i n • ,i to the Nations. 

Lord working with them and confirming the 
word with signs following." 71 It is now in place to observe 
how the work of the apostolate progressed, and how the doc- 
trines and practice of the Christian religion became diffused 
abroad among mankind, under the ministry of the apostles 
and their immediate successors during the first three centuries. 
"Waiving" mere opinions which are not eviden- §242. The 

Voice of 

tial, and crediting the facts conceded touching Disbelief, 
the rapid spread of Christianity, we begin with Tacitus. 

"At first only those were arrested who acknowledged [themselves 
Christians]. Next, on their information a vast number [of others] were 
convicted [of being Christians]." 72 Pliny affirms that "Many of every 
age, of every rank, and of either sex, are exposed and will be exposed to 
danger. Nor has the contagion of the superstition been confined to the 
cities, but it extends to the villages, and even to the [open] country. 

« Matt, xxviii, 19; TropevdivTe? odv ixadr}Te6<ra,T€ irdvra ra edvq, Mark xvl, 20. 
™ Annals, xv, 44; comp, Matt, xxiv, 9, 10. 



834 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

The temples had already been deserted and the victims heretofore could 
hardly find a purchaser. . . . From this it is easy to imagine what 
a multitude of men might be retained, if pardon should be afforded to 
those who repent 73 [of following Chri&t]." Lucian exclaims: " Pontus 
is full of Atheists and Christians!" 74 Julian writes: "Many of you, it 
seems, I have offended — in a manner all of you: the Senate, the rich, 
the people. The greatest part of the people, or rather the whole of them, 
are offended at me because they love impiety, and they see that I embrace 
and adhere to the religion of my ancestors." 75 "A great multitude of 
men in the cities of Greece and Italy were seized with this distemper." 76 
Josephus alleges that " Jesus was a teacher of such as received the truth 
with gladness. He carried away with him many of the Jews and also 
of the Greeks." 77 Toledoth Jeshu concedes that " Israel went after 
him, and some of them were reputable people who confirmed the doc- 
trine of Jeshu [i. e., Jesus] and declared that they were his messengers ; 
and they gathered unto them a vast multitude of Israel; that the 
number of his disciples amounted to two thousand ; that the belief in 
him increased more and more for thirty years after his death ; that his 
followers were called Nazarenes ; and that the belief in Jesus became 
strong and spread abroad until they numbered thousands and tens of 
thousands." 

Clement of Eome says: " Saint Paul preached both in the East and 
in the West, taught the whole world righteousness, and traveled to the 
utmost bounds of the West." 78 Ignatius of Antioch 
§243. Con- men tions "bishops that are settled in the farthest parts 
Christians °^ * ne eart h-" 79 Justin Martyr of Palestine says : " There 
is not a single race of men, whether Barbarians or Greeks, 
or those dwelling in wagons, or without houses, or such as dwell in 
tents, 80 among whom prayers and thanksgiving are not offered to the 
Father and Creator of all things through the name of the crucified 
Jesus." 81 Irenseus of Lyons wrote: "The Church, though dispersed 
throughout the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, has received 
from the apostles and their disciples this faith." 82 Tertullian of Car- 
thage said: "We are but of yesterday, and we have filled every place 
among you; [your] cities, islands, fortresses, towns, market-places, the 
camp, tribes, companies, palace, Senate, Forum: we have left you noth- 
ing but the temples of your gods." 83 "The outcry is that the State is 
filled with Christians ; that they are in the fields, in the citadels, in the 
islands. They [the accusers] make lamentation as for some calamity, 
that both sexes, every age and condition, even high rank, are passing 
over to the profession of the Christian faith." 84 " For upon whom else 



73 Official Epis. to Trajan. See Append., Excursus B. 

™Lard. vii, 283, 284. ™ Misopogon, lb. vii, 647. ™lb. 628. 

it Ant. xviii, 3, 3. ^Epis. to Cor. c. 5; ccmip. Philipp. iv, 3. 

" Epis. to Eph. c. 3. 80 ' A/j.a$;oi3iwv=nomad tribes. 

81 Dialogue with Tryphon, c. 117. 82 Heresies, c. 10, 1. 

<*Apol. c. 37. ^Ib. c. 1. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their "Work. 335 

have the [universal] nations believed but upon the Christ who is already 
come? For whom have the nations believed: Parthians, Medes, Elam- 
ites, and they who inhabit Mesopotamia, Armenia, Phrygia, Cappadocia, 
and they who dwell in Pontus, and Asia, and Pamphylia, tarriers in 
Egypt, and inhabiters in the region of Africa which is beyond Cyrene, 
Romans and sojourners: yes, and in Jerusalem Jews, and all other 
nations. ... In all places the name of Christ who is already come 
reigns, as of him by whom the gates of all cities have been opened, and 
to whom none are closed, before whom iron bars have been crumbled, 
and brazen gates opened. ... In all these places dwell the people 
of the name of Christ." 86 " For if such multitudes of men were to 
break away from you, and betake themselves to some remote corner of 
the world, why, the very loss of so many citizens . . . would cover 
the empire with shame ; nay, in the very forsaking, vengeance would be 
inflicted. Why, you would be horror-stricken at the solitude in which 
you would find yourselves at such all-prevailing silence, and that stupor 
as of a dead world. You would have to seek subjects to govern. You 
would have more enemies than citizens remaining. For now it is the 
immense number of Christians which makes our enemies so few ; almost 
all the inhabitants of your various cities being followers of Christ." 86 

Origen of Alexandria shall speak the final word on the 
success of the Gospel up to his time. Writing a little more 
than two centuries after the crucifixion, this eminent and 
learned apologist said: 

"Any one who examines will see that Jesus attempted and success- 
fully accomplished works beyond the reach of human power. For 
although, from the very beginning, all things opposed the spread of his 
doctrine in the world, both the princes of the times, and their chief 
captains and generals, and all — to speak generally — who were possessed 
of the smallest influence ; and in addition to these, the rulers of the 
different cities, and the soldiers, and the people ; yet it proved victori- 
ous, as being the WORD OF GOD, the nature of which is such that it 
can not be hindered ; and becoming more powerful than all such adver- 
saries, it made itself master of the whole of Greece, and a considerable 
portion of barbarian lands, and converted countless souls to his relig- 
ion." 87 "But the God who sent Jesus, dissipated all the conspiracies 
of the demons, and made the Gospel of Jesus to prevail throughout the 
whole world, for the conversion and reformation of men ; and caused 
the Churches to be everywhere established in opposition to those of 
superstition and licentiousness and wicked men ; for such is the char- 
acter of the multitudes who constitute the citizens in the assemblies of 
various cities ; . . . for who would not admit that even the inferior 
members of the Church, and those who in comparison with the better 

&Ans. to Jews, c. 7. ^Apol. c. 37. & Contra. Cels. i, 27. 

22 



336 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

are less worthy, are nevertheless more excellent than many of those 
who belong to the assemblies in different districts?" * " Christians do 
not neglect, so far as in them lies, to take measures to disseminate their 
doctrine throughout the whole world. Some of them accordingly have 
made it their business to itinerate, not only through cities, but even 
villages and country houses, that they might make converts to God." 
"At the present day, indeed, when, owing to the multitude of Christian 
believers, not only rich men, but persons of rank and delicate and 
high-born ladies receive the teachings of Christianity." 89 

In the temporal sense, the success of Christianity culmi- 
nated when it had effected a conquest over the idolatrous 
§ 244. cnris- system which had been incorporated into the 
the^oman government of Kome, when all oppositions and 

Empire. persecutions were disallowed by law, and when 
Christianity had itself become the established religion of the 
State, under Constantine the Great. This, however, did not 
all come to pass suddenly, but was the progressive development 
of some years. Although Constantine did not identify himself 
personally with the Christian Church until just prior to his 
death in 337, he issued several imperial decrees which led up to 
the adoption of the Christian religion by the empire. The first 
Edict of Toleration was issued in A. D. 311, which put an end 
to persecutions. The second Edict of Toleration was issued in 
313, which was preparative for legal protection and final rec- 
ognition. The Mcene Council assembled in 325, over which 
the emperor presided in person; a Council which has been 
properly designated " the solemn inauguration of the Imperial 
State-Church." » 

"In 312, Constantine, in conjunction with his Eastern colleague, 
Licinius, had published an Edict of Eeligious Toleration not now ex- 
tant. ... In January, 313, the two emperors issued from Milan a 
new Edict (the third) on religion, still extant, both in Latin and Greek, in 
which in the spirit of religious eclecticism they granted full freedom of 
all existing forms of worship with special reference to the Christian. 
This religion the Edict not only recognized in its existing limits, but 
also — what neither the first nor perhaps the second had done — allowed 
every heathen subject to adopt with impunity. At the same time the 

83 Contra. Cels. iii, 29, 89 j&. m, 9. 

*>See Schaff, Hist. Christ. Church, Vol. II; Preface, p. v. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 337 

church buildings and property, [previously] confiscated in the Diocletian 
persecution, were ordered to be restored, and private property owners 
to be indemnified from the imperial treasury/ 5 In March, 313, " he 
exempted the Christian clergy from military and municipal duty ; 
abolished various customs and ordinances offensive to Christians in 315 ; 
facilitated the emancipation of Christian slaves [before 316] ; legalized 
bequests to Catholic Churches in 321 ; . . . contributed liberally to 
building churches and the support of the clergy ; erased the heathen 
symbols of Jupiter and Apollo, Mars and Hercules, from imperial coins 
(323) ; and gave his sons a Christian education. . . . The emperor 
now issued a general exhortation to his subjects to embrace the Chris- 
tian religion, still leaving them, however, to their own conviction, 
. . . in 324." 

"The first Edict of Toleration, A. D. 311, made an end of persecu- 
tion ; the second Edict of Toleration, 313, prepared the way for legal 
recognition and protection ; the Nicene Council, 325, marks the solemn 
inauguration of the Imperial State-Church. 91 

Such was the progress and the success of Christianity 
which attended the apostles' preaching Christ's Gospel to the 
nations. What account, then, do the historical 

' ' § 245. The 

Scriptures of the New Testament give of the scriptural 
apostles' ministry and miracles, which history ccoun • 
records as opening such a new and amazing era to the world? 
First, on the day of Pentecost at Jerusalem, which dates the 
occasion of their first investiture of power and spiritual coro- 
nation, the apostles stood up before the vast multitudes assem- 
bled, and received from heaven each a naming crown. 92 The 
fruit of their first day's labor for Christ and Christianity, at 
the metropolis of the Jews, was three thousand souls. 93 A few 
days later, "a notable miracle" was wrought — the first dis- 
tinctively known by the apostles — and five thousand converts 
were added to the Church. 94 Then " a great company of priests 
became obedient to the f aith ;" % after that, "believers were 
added to the Church, multitudes of both men and women;" 96 
then there were "myriads" 97 of Jews who gladly accepted the 
Christian doctrine and life. The jealousy of the Jews, how- 
ever, now found its expression in persecutions vehement and 

^Hist. Christ. Church, Vol. Iii, 29-32; Preface to Vol. II, p. 1. 92 Acts ii, 3, etc. 
™Ib. ii, 41. 94j & .iv, 4. 95i&. vli 7. 96 J6. v ,i 4 . 97 Mvpidde?, lb. xxi, 20. 



338 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

fierce, and full of fanaticism. They seized some of the Twelve 
and inprisoned them; 98 they beat and threatened them." 
Herod Agrippa I, having arrested Peter, and James, the 
brother of John, intended to have them slain. James was be- 
headed, Peter was incarcerated, but found deliverance through 
the interposition of an angel. 100 Stephen was stoned to death. 101 
Saul of Tarsus "made havoc of the Church," and continued 
"breathing out threatenings and slaughter." 102 At length the 
apostles of the Lord, as he had enjoined upon them scattered, 
abroad to other cities and nations, but continued their preach- 
ing and miracles as they went. 

Yery soon the city of Antioch, in Syria, became the great 
center of the Gentile Christians, as Jerusalem had been the 
great center of the Jewish Christians. From this geograph- 
ical point, Paul, Barnabas, and Silas planned and executed ex- 
tensive missionary journeys abroad in the interests of Christian- 
ity and humanity. They traversed the Koman provinces em- 
braced in Asia Minor, and along the coast of Eastern Europe, 
organizing mission stations in the various communities, civili- 
zations, and States, and in the larger centers and capitals, offer- 
ing the salvation of the gospel first to the Jews, and after- 
wards to the Gentiles. And wherever they went many souls 
were won to the Lord. To this end, they traversed lands, and 
seas, and islands, publishing Christ's name and love. 

They touched at cities made forever famous in classic 
story, announcing the glad tidings of a Savior come, who was 
"the Desire of Nations." There were "Mitylene, the beauti- 
ful;" Chios, the birthplace of Homer; Samos, where iEsop, 
the immortal fabulist, first opened his eyes upon the world; 
Miletus, the home of Thales, one of the seven wise men of 
Greece; Athens, the seat of learning and culture before the 
world, "the very eye of Greece," where Euclid wrought out 
his geometric propositions; where Demosthenes thundered 

98 Acts iv, 3. "i7>. v, 40 ; iv, 17, 18. 10 ° lb. v, xii. 

i°i lb. vii, 58. m Ib. viii, 1-3 ; ix, 1. 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 339 

forth his eloquence against Philip; where the genius of 
Phidias and Praxiteles and Alcamedes embodied their fame in 
the beautiful arts on marbles, as enduring as time. There 
were Macedonia, where Aristotle was born; and Philippi, 
where Augustus and Mark Antony triumphed in battle over 
Brutus and Cassius ; and Actium, where Antony and Cleopatra 
conjointly were defeated by Octavius; and Ephesus, where 
Alexander the Great proffered all his spoils of war in Asia for 
the privilege of carving his own name upon the great temple 
of Diana, " one of the Seven "Wonders of the World." Then, 
there were Egypt, the university of the nations, and its vast 
Alexandrian library; Italy, wherein centered the great mili- 
tary power which ruled the world ; where Cicero spoke in his 
charming eloquence; where Sallust and Livy, Horace and 
Ovid and Yirgil thought, or wrote, or sung. And there was 
old Rome itself, the world-capital, in which the first pagan 
persecutions began under Nero, and near which they also 
ended. These capitals and cities, among others, were cap- 
tured soon by the Prince of Peace, and in turn became centers 
of the new and Christly influence. How effectual was the 
work may be best understood by the Jews' outcry in opposi- 
tion at Thessalonica : "These that have turned the world up- 
side down are come hither also." Meantime, Tacitus at 
Pome, the greatest of Poman historians, records that the 
Christian religion, though suppressed for a brief time, was 
that "pernicious superstition which had burst forth again," 
and spread from Judaea to the capital of the empire, and that 
"a vast multitude" were convicted of the crime of being 
Christians ! And the younger Pliny, entering upon the gov- 
ernment of Pontus and Bithynia, reports to the emperor 
that "the contagion of the superstition" had spread through 
the cities and the land, so that "many of every age and every 
rank, and of either sex, were exposed to the danger" of the 
inflictions of persecutors. 



340 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Meantime, Christianity was bitterly opposed by several 

schools of philosophy — the Cynics, the Epicureans, the ISTeo- 

Platonists, and the Eclectics — as if by a coali- 

§ 246. Obsta- _ ' J 

ciesand tion. The literature of the day assailed the 
Christian religion. Celsus, of the Epicurean or 
Eclectic school, taking counsel of his prejudices and of the 
Jews' malice, wrote a treatise to break the power of Christ, 
whom he did not hesitate to call "an impostor," verifying 
and vindicating the predictive statement of the devout and 
just Simeon : " Behold, this Child is set for the falling and the 
rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that will be spoken 
against." Lucian, his contemporary, the universal infidel re- 
specting all religions, wasted his impotent scorn on the poor 
Christians, calling their religion "the latest folly in the world's 
great madhouse." Julian the Emperor, known as the "Apos- 
tate," acknowledged that the Senate, the rich, aye, "the 
greatest part of the people, or rather the whole of them, were 
in love with impiety," for rejecting and condemning the mon- 
strous fraud of the pagan gods elected by the State ; and he 
affirms that " a great multitude of men in Greece and Italy 
were seized with this [mental] distemper." The rabbinical 
work called Toledoth Jeshu admits that the Christian converts 
within thirty years of Christ's crucifixion, " became strong, and 
spread abroad until they numbered thousands and tens of 
thousands." These are the witness of foes outside the Chris- 
tian world. In confirmation of their testimony is that of 
Clement and Ignatius, of Justin and Irenceus, and of Ter- 
tullian and Origen, who enter into the minutiae of the Chris- 
tian life, as known from the interior standpoint of ancient 
Christendom. 

And with what forces in the field did Christianity meet 
this coalition of its adversaries from the seats of literature and 
philosophy? Without arsenals or armies, without friends or 
wealth or influence, it opposed the sanctity of ancestral re- 
ligions, the prejudice of contempt for a "new" worship, which 



The Apostles of Jesus Christ and Their Work. 341 

had for its object an unseen and "unknown God," and the 
constant presence and demands of Koman law and imperial 
armies which stood across its path of progress. Yet it did 
more than win hearts by the multitude ; it destroyed the im- 
ages of the heathen gods, and overthrew the altars dedicated 
to them. It swept away the religious systems of ancient pa- 
ganism, born of a degenerate human nature, full of degrading 
superstitions and depraving sensualities — systems which had 
required whole generations and ages to grow into form, and 
incorporate into laws, and organize into institutions of the 
State. It caused the sacred temples, which had become 
dimmed and hoary with the sanctity and services of past an- 
tiquities, to be vacated by their votaries, and abandoned to be 
the abode of the bat and the midnight owl. Within three 
centuries of the crucifixion it had won its way by virtue of its 
intrinsic worth, permeating whole populations of the continents, 
and so changing the course of history that, when Constantine 
came to the throne as the sole ruler, of the empire, the world 
was prepared for the great change to come, and, seizing the 
diadem of the CaBsars, placed it upon the imperial brow of this 
follower of the lowly Nazarene — the first Christian emperor. 
That old government which was once the synonym for power, 
with its horrible dungeons and tortures, its stakes and crosses 
wherewith to punish the Christians, has long since gone down 
to the dust and perished from before the eyes of men. But 
from its ancient ruins there have risen unto Jesus, the once 
despised, crucified One, but now " the King, eternal, immortal, 
invisible, the only wise God," " a dominion, and a glory, and a 
kingdom, that all people and nations and languages should 
serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion which 
shall not pass away, and his kingdom shall not be destroyed." 

"The gospel, preached by men without name, without study, with- 
out eloquence, cruelly persecuted, and destitute of all human support, 
did not fail to get established in a short time throughout the whole 
world. It is a fact which nobody can deny, and a fact which proves that 
the work was of God." 



342 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

inductions. 

1. Christianity possesses an Historical Monument in the Name 

of its great Founder. 

2. Christ's apostles are accorded a place in history even by his 

worst adversaries. 

3. Success among the nations was ever secured by Divine 

Truth, attested by miracles. 

4. Permanency was insured by the power of conscious experi- 

ence and life in believers. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

THE PEKSECUTIONS OF THE PEIMITIYE 
CHKISTIANS. 

I. Heathen Opinions op Christians and Christianity. 

a) Opinions reflected by Epictetus, Tacitus, Pliny, Suetonius, 

Antoninus, Galen, Porphyry, and Julian. 
/3) Watchwords given the Christians by the Apostle Paul. 

II. Primitive Christians Blameless in Character. 

a) Affirmations by Adversaries: Pliny, Lucian, Julian, and 

an Arabian. 
/S) Confirmation by Adherents: Aristides, Apollonius, and 

Didache. 

III. Prediction op Persecutions uttered by Christ. 

1. Jewish Persecutions. 

2. Roman Persecutions. 

a. Literary Persecutions. 

b. Imperial Persecutions. 

c. Roman Punishments. 

IV. Occasion for the Persecution op the Christians. 
a) Witness of the Persecutors. 

/3) Graffiti in Caricature of Christ. 

V. Voice op Modern Historians respecting Early Persecu- 

tions. 

Edward Gibbon, Thomas Arnold, Wm. E. H. Lecky, Philip 
Schaff, McClintock and Strong. 

A General Survey op the Situation. 
a) The Aggressive Character of the Gospel. 
P) The Effects of Aggression on the Natural Man. 
y) The Exaltation of the Christians in Sufering. 

Inductions. 
343 



Chapter XIII. 

THE PEBSECUTIONS OF THE PKIMITIVE 
CHKISTIANS. 

§ 247. Sources : Biographical Epitomes, Testimonies and Literature. 

1. Juvenal (A. D. 50-130) was the contemporary of Tacitus and Pliny, 

the friend of Martial, and lived during the reign of four success- 
ive emperors. Moreover, he was the author of sixteen Satires, 
which are still read with much interest by men of letters, as well 
as by the student of the ancient classics. He evidently refers in 
his first Satire to the sufferings imposed upon the Christians in 
the reign of Nero, as also described by Tacitus and Suetonius ; 
facts which occurred about thirty years after the crucifixion, of 
which some have supposed Juvenal to have been an eye-witness. 
Alluding to a wretch who was a minister and minion of Nero, Juve- 
nal wrote : 

"Pone Tigellinum, tseda lucebis in 
Qua stantes ardent, qui fixo gutture fumant, 
Et latum media sulcum deducit arena." — Sat. lib. i, 255-157. 

2. Martial (A. D. 95) a Latin epigrammatist of celebrity, the author of 

twelve books which have come down to us. He was of Spanish 
blood, born in the reign of the Emperor Claudius, in the year 48, 
and died near the same place in 104. He is mentioned by Pliny 
junior, as the intimate friend of Juvenal, and he was the favorite 
of several emperors under whose reign he lived. Coming to Rome 
at the age of twenty-three, when Nero was on the throne, he had 
ample opportunities to acquaint himself with the emperor's 
methods of persecution of the Christians, and was undoubtedly 
an eye-witness of the great conflagration of the capital in the year 
54, and all the wicked cruelties which Nero practiced upon the 
resident Christians of Rome. One of Martial's epigrams is based 
upon Nero's tortures of the Christians inflicted upon his innocent 
subjects, to gratify " the ferocity of one man." He says: 

" In matutina nuper spectatus arena, 
Mucius, imposuit, qui sua membra focis, 
345 



346 Historical Evidence of the JSTew Testament. 

Si patiens fortisque tibi durusque videtur, 

Abderitanse pectora plebis habes. 

Nam, cum dicatur, tunica prsesente molesta, 

Urn manum, plus est dicere; non facio." 

25. — Lib. x, Epigr. 

3. Lucius Ann^us Seneca (65) was a Stoic philosopher and the teacher 

of Nero. He was a rhetorician of fame, the contemporary of the 
Apostle Paul. Eetiring from public life, he offered his ample 
fortune to the emperor, who declined to receive it, and having 
incurred Nero's suspicion, Seneca, in his old age, was ordered by 
his former pupil, Nero, to commit suicide, which he proceeded 
to do at once. He was a spectator of the burning of Eome in the 
year 64, and probably witnessed the sufferings of the Christians 
for his own guilt in ordering the city to be burned. Seneca 
describes the cruelest appliances in vogue with the Roman Gov- 
ernment to impose slow tortures, and finally death, upon supposed 
criminals. 

4. Epistle to Diognetus (date A. D. 100-150) is a document supposed 

to have been addressed to a heathen philosopher of note and cul- 
ture. An early teacher of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius bore the 
name Diognetus, who was a Stoic philosopher. The language and 
style of the Epistle would indicate an Alexandrian origin and 
authorship ; but the hypothesis that this Diognetus was the tutor 
of Aurelius, places its composition at Rome. Possibly its author 
was Pantsenus, the head of the Alexandrian Theological School 
and the tutor of Clement of Alexandria. In chapter xi of this 
document the writer claims to have been a.Tro<rTo\wv /xadijT^ " a 
disciple of the apostles," who had "become a teacher of the 
Gentiles." Bishop Lightfoot speaks of this letter as "one of the 
most impressive of the early Christian Apologists in style and 
treatment," "the simplicity in the mode of stating theological 
truth, and the absence of all reference to the manifold heresies of 
the earlier time/' point to the middle of the second century as 
the proper date of this Epistle. (See Bishop Lightfoot's Apostl. 
Fathers, 488.) Dr. Schaff, however, suggests that the time of its 
composition was " rather earlier than later than this date." 
(Hist. Christ. Church, ii, 702.) 

5. Apollonius (d. 185) was an eminent Christian Apologist when Corn- 

modus was upon the throne. Christianity, stigmatized at that time 
as " the new religion," because having neither ancestral traditions 
from antiquity to command Roman respect, nor identification with 
a nation to yield it prestige in standing, was condemned by the 
Senate to be exterminated. Eusebius mentions "Apollonius, one 
of the faithful of that day, renowned for his learning and wisdom," 
who was led to the tribunal. "But this most approved and 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 347 



divinely-favored martyr, as the judge [Perennis] earnestly desired 
and entreated him to give an account of himself before the Senate, 
delivered a most eloquent defense of the faith for which he was 
suffering, in the presence of all, and terminated his life by decapi- 
tation, according to the decree of the Senate." (E. H. B. V. c. 21.) 
At his execution the magistrate said: "I would fain let thee go, 
but can not because of the decree of the Senate ; yet with 
benevolence I pronounce sentence on thee ;" and he ordered 
him to be beheaded with the sword." (Conybeare in Monuments 
of Christianity, p. 48.) 

6. Thomas Arnold (1795-1842) was an eminent English historian, teacher, 

and divine. Graduated at Oxford in 1814, he became " Head 
Master of Eugby School," and managed its affairs with pre-emi- 
nent success. In 1838-1842 he issued his best work on the History 
of Rome ( 3 vols. ; incomplete ). " His chief excellence lay . . . 
in analyzing laws, parties, and institutions." (Stanley.) In 1841, 
he was made Regius Professor of Modern History in Oxford Uni- 
versity. He was father of Matthew Arnold, the poet, and William 
D. Arnold. He was a high-toned Christian gentleman. 

7. Epictetus (109) was an Eclectic philosopher, born about the middle of 

the first century. He was at first a slave, then a freedman ; he 
began his philosophic teachings at Rome, was expelled from the 
city by order of the Senate before the year 90, in the reign of 
Domitian. His manner of life is described as exceedingly eccen- 
tric ; he was naked, penniless, wifeless, childless; without a 
want or a wish, without passion or temper, independent, imper- 
turbable, indifferent to life or death. Epictetus nowhere des- 
ignates Christianity by that name, but he does mention the 
Galileans as those who evinced no fear of death by martyrdom ; a 
fortitude which was so much superior to his own philosophy 
that he attributes it to " madness " of mind. 

8. Heinrich E. G. Paulus (1761-1851) was born at Wiirtemberg, stud- 

ied theology and Oriental languages at Tubingen, ^Gottingen, Lon- 
don, and Paris ; was chosen professor at Jena, and in Heidelberg in 
1811. He became a prominent rationalist in theology in respect 
to history and criticism, and adopted some strange and extrava- 
gant views, especially in regard to Christ's miracles. Notwith- 
standing his acute skill, his great learning, and large experience 
in historical exposition, he was so mentally perverted by his 
preconceptions of Christianity, which he adopted to fit his views, 
that he severely taxed the credulity of his readers far more to 
accept his extravagant theories than was called for to believe 
the simple and obvious story of miracles in the Gospels. His 
Life of Jesus (1828) and his Commentary on the New Testament (Vol. 
IV, 1800-1807) were his chief works. 



348 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

9. Galen — Claudius Galenus (130-200) was born at Pergamus, Asia 
Minor. He was a physician of great celebrity, was twice called for 
professional services in the imperial household of Aurelius and 
Verus, as he was without a peer in his profession. He exerted a 
powerful influence upon the whole medical profession for a period 
of thirteen hundred years. 

§ 248. The Persecution of the Christians. 

The rules of the highest living are the Gospels of Christ.— Edmund 
Burke. 

Of all systems of morality, none appears so pure to me as that of 
Jesus. — Jefferson. 

It was inevitable that the preaching of the new sect, even while they 
were disseminated with much reserve, should revive the animosi- 
ties which had accumulated against its Founder, and had ulti- 
mately resulted in his death.— RenAn. 

It was to sustain the deliberate and systematic attack of the temporal 
power, arming in almost every part of the empire in defense of 
the ancient Polytheism. — Milman. 

It was the greatest absurdity that can be conceived for any to impose 
on others a worship contrary to their conscience, or deny to men 
the liberty to choose their own religion. It is not religion, but a 
love of power, that makes men persecutors. — Lactantius. 

The whole body of Christians unanimously refused to hold any com- 
munion with the gods of Rome, of the empire, and of mankind. 
It was in vain that the oppressed believer asserted the inalienable 
rights of conscience and private judgment. — Edward Gibbon. 

And ye shall be hated of all men for my Name's sake. — Jesus. 

Auatcdfievoi, dXX' ovk eyicaTakenrofxepoi, KarapaWd/jLevoi, dXX' ovk airoWOixevoL' = 
" Persecuted, but not forsaken ; cast down, but not destroyed." 
— Paul. 

ARGUMENT. 

The early Christians were distinguished for their purity and blameless- 
ness of life. Nevertheless, profane writers evidence a common 
dislike and contempt, even among the better classes of heathen, 
as regards Christians and the Christian religion. Such misappre- 
hension of character naturally led to open hostility against Chris- 
tianity. Christ had himself predicted that his followers would 
have much tribulation. His apostles after him were the first to 
suffer persecution. Though subjected to terrible cruelties and 
outrages on account of their faith in Christ, the apostolic writers 
record no complaints or bitterness on this account. While de- 
ploring that any believer should suffer for any given crime, yet 
to suffer as a Christian was a ground for glorying. 

The persecutions of the Christians by Jews and Gentiles 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 349 

were manifold in number and terrible in experience. They 
suffered by imperial decrees, but especially by Sanhedrists and 
by provincial governors. The ungovernable malice and fanaticism 
of the Jews against Jesus was transferred to his followers. When 
mere reasoning was protested as being insufficient for the de- 
mands of religion and of our spiritual nature, the philosophers of 
the day antagonized Christianity. But the chief offense of the 
Christians consisted in their pronounced opposition to the gods of 
the State as false, immoral, and degrading. Instead, they intro- 
duced a " new religion," which had neither the sanction nor the 
sanctity of antiquity to commend it, and had no nation behind 
it to command respect for it or enforce its claims. The Chris- 
tians persistently refused as an act of worship to burn incense to 
the statue of an emperor, and declined absolutely to revile the 
name of Jesus Christ as a test of loyalty to the government. 
Thereupon the inalienable rights of conscience were outraged by 
violence and persecution. As the empire, of which the emperor 
was the high pontiff, had incorporated into its organic structure 
the exclusive rights of religion, Christianity was imperially de- 
nounced, and those who advocated or adhered to the faith were 
declared to be guilty of high treason. 

1. Heathen Opinions of Christians and Christianity. 

2. Character of the Primitive Christians Blameless. 

3. The Occasion for the Persecution of Christians. 

I. Heathen Opinions. 

"What the Roman heathen opinions were respecting Chris- 
tians and the Christian religion is sufficiently re- . 
fleeted in the following testimonies, which have ions of 
been transmitted to us in their own writings. 
Let us take no other than the views entertained by their own 
representative men. 

a) Epictetus wrote (109) respecting the fortitude of Chris- 
tians who had to brave martyrdom, because they could not 
and would not worship the false gods chosen by the State, and 
execrate Christ, as Roman magistrates required : 

"Is it possible that a man may arrive at that temper and become 
indifferent to those things from madness or habit as the Galileans'* do, 

*Suidas, a man of letters, writing in the tenth century, said: "In the time 
of the Emperor Claudius (41-54) they who before had been called 'Nazarenes ' and 
'Galileans? received a new name at Antioch, and were called Christians.' 1 ' 1 See 
Act3 xi, 26. 



350 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

and yet no one should be able to know by reason or demonstration that 
God made all things in the world?" 1 

/?) Tacitus (110), the famous historian, says of the Jews : 

"Whatever might be the origin of their religion, it has the ad- 
vantage of antiquity;" but Christianity was "the deadly superstition 2 
[which], repressed for a time, broke out again, not only in Judaea, where 
the mischief originated, but throughout the city of Rome also, where all 
things horrible and disgraceful flow from all quarters as a common re- 
ceptacle, and where they are encouraged." 

y) Pliny, junior, (112), when proconsul of Pontus and Bi- 

thynia, in his official report to the Emperor Trajan, expressed 

his prejudice against the Christian religion in severest terms. 

After torturing two deaconesses to compel a confession of 

mere imaginary wrongs in Christian practices, he writes : 

"I could discover nothing but a perverse and extravagant supersti- 
tion." 5 " There were others also under like infatuation, but as they were 
Roman citizens, I directed them to be sent to the capital." "Nor has 
the contagion of the superstition* been confined to cities, but has ex- 
tended to the towns, and even to the open country." " But the crime 
spread as is wont while the prosecutions were going on;" and "what- 
ever the nature of their profession might be, a stubborn and unyielding 
obstinacy certainly deserved punishment [with death] !" 5 

8) Suetonius (122), the distinguished biographer of the 
Twelve Ccesars, also shared in this unreasonable prejudice ; for 
in his work he is careful to mention " the Christians as a class 
of men of a new and deceitful superstition." 6 

e) Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (d. about 180), the Stoic 
philosopher and emperor (161-180), "had no room in his cos- 
mopolitan philanthropy for the purest and most innocent of 
his subjects, many of whom served in his army." In his re- 
flective moments he wrote : 

" What a soul that is which is ready, if at any moment it must be 
separated from the body, either to be extinguished or dispersed, or to 

i 'Twb fiavla?, Lib. 4, c. 7, cited by Lard, vii, 88, 89. 
-' Exitiabilis superstitio, Annals, xv, 44. 
3 Prava et iramodica superstitio. 

<Contagio pervagata est . . . pervicacia inflexibilis obstenatio. 
6 Diffundente se crimine. Epis. x, 97. See App., Excursus, B. 
6 Superstitionis novae et maleflcae = deceptive; magical, with reference to 
miracles. Nero, 16. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 351 

continue to exist; but [only] so that this readiness [to die] comes from 
a man's own judgment, not from mere obstinacy as with the Christians, 1 
but considerately, and with dignity, and in a way to persuade another 
without scenic display." 8 

£) Claudius Galenas ("Galen" 180), a physician of great 
celebrity and a high authority in the healing art, remarked of 
those of his profession who refused to be united in faith and 
practice as physicians : " It is easier to convince the disciples 
of Moses and Christ than physicians and philosophers who are 
addicted to particular sects." 9 

rj) Porphyry (270), a man famous in the literature of the 
Roman world, knew so little of Christianity, which yet he de- 
spised, that he speaks of — 

"Origen as a Greek, being educated in Greek literature, but who 
went over to the barbarian temerity, 10 . . . living contrary to the 
laws." "And now the people wonder that this distemper 11 has oppressed 
the city so long, iEsculapius and the other gods no longer conversing 
with men. For since Jesus has been honored none have received any 
public benefits from the gods." 

6) Julian the Emperor (361) was not only "an apostate" 

from the faith, but was bitterly opposed to Christianity, as his 

own words witness : 

"A great multitude of men in the cities of Greece and Italy are 
seized with this mental malady." "By the madness of the Galileans all 
things were brought to the brink of ruin ; and now we are all safe by 
the goodness of the gods." "I think it right to show to all men the 
reasons by which I have been convinced that the religion of the Galile- 
ans is a human contrivance, badly put together, having nothing in it 
divine, but abusing the childish, irrational part of the soul which delights 
in fable. They [the Christians] have introduced a heap of wonderful 
works to give it the appearance of truth." He mentions " the calamity 
[which the Christians] brought upon themselves, who, forsaking the 
immortal gods, betake themselves to dead men." " Shall we, for this, 
most hate the understanding, or most pity the simple and ignorant 

7 Kara xpiKijv irapdrat-Lv = according to naked discipline. 

s ' ATpdycpdoi? = "without noise or fuss." Medit. xi, 3. 

a De Differentia Pulsuum, lib. ii, p. 22. (See Lard, vii, 301.) 

1( >~np6g- rb fidpfiapov i^wKeike r6A / u.?7,aa=" ran aground respecting the barbarian 
act of daring;" i. e., in rejecting the heathen gods, and resisting the emperor's 
edict. See Lard, vii, 397, and Euseb. E. H. vi, 224. 

11 'H p6o-og-=" sickness, disease, distemper." 
23 



352 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

among you who are so unhappy as to leave the immortal gods and go 
over to a dead Jew ?" 12 

"With such preconceptions and misconceptions as to what 
Christianity is, and what it proposes to do in the interests of 
mankind ; in the utter want of a conception of the spirituality 
of the Christian religion and of the spiritual satisfaction 
which it brings to man's spiritual nature, it is easy to see how 
such men, in their ignorance, should denounce the " new relig- 
ion" as "a deadly superstition," " a mental malady," " a bar- 
barian temerity;" that absolute loyalty to conviction and 
conscience should be called "sheer obstinacy," " deserving of 
punishment" unto death; and that Christian triumph, even in 
martyrdom, should be regarded as a mere "tragical display" 
before men! With Julian the fault of the Christians was 
" madness," as it was with Festus at Caesarea-on-the-Sea, who 
exclaimed: "Paul, thou art mad; thy much learning doth 
turn thee to madness !" 13 

It should not be overlooked that these writers cited were 
of the foremost men of their period who accused the Chris- 
tians, — authors, historians, philosophers, proconsul, procurators, 
emperor. They were not men of the common populace, but 
men of position and culture, distinguished as leaders of thought, 
and conspicuous for their influence and activity. Unquestion- 
ably such men reflected the views entertained by the common 
people respecting Christians and Christianity. It was because 
the Christians refused absolutely to execrate the name of 
Christ, but, instead, exalted him as the object of their loving 
adoration, that they were supposed to have been smitten with 
"madness." Because they withdrew themselves from associa- 
tion with the heathen, who indulged themselves in sinful 
pleasures and vices, "they were hated of all men" for his 
sake. Because they would not frequent the heathen temples, 
and sacrifice to the imaginary and disreputable gods of heathen 

w See Greek text and transl. in Lard, vii, 628, 596, 622, 659,630 . 
i»Acts xxvi,24. R. V. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 353 

worship, Christians were denounced as "Atheists." To this 
open charge Justin responds to the government in his defens- 
ive address : 

" We are called Atheists ; and we confess that we are Atheists so far 
as this sort of gods is concerned ; but not with respect to the most true 
God, the Father of righteousness." " For they proclaim our ' madness' 
to consist in this : that we give to a crucified man a place second to the 
unchangeable and eternal God, the Creator of all.' 514 

As to the fact, the charge was true ; but the inference was 
false that Christians were therefore degenerates. Truly did 
the skeptical Edward Gibbon assert : 

"The whole body of Christians unanimously refuse to hold com- 
munion with the gods of Rome, of the empire, and of mankind. It was 
in vain that the oppressed believer asserted the inalienable right of conscience 
and private judgment." 15 

Of course, it lies in the nature of the case that truth should 
ever be found antagonistic to error, or it would not be true to 
itself. That the prevailing prejudice and passion 
should be aggravated and intensified by the atti- ' words of the 
tude of opposition which Christianity assumed 
against the pagan religion is perfectly natural and obvious, 
when we recall the ringing watchwords of the early Christians : 

" For what fellowship hath righteousness with iniquity ? Or what 
communion hath light with darkness ? And what concord hath Christ 
with Belial ? Or what portion hath a believer with an infidel ? Or 
what agreement hath a temple of God with idols ?" 16 

When, then, these intelligent pagans who were without the 
knowledge of the truth, saw the religion of their own ances- 
tors disowned and the gods of the State forsaken ; a religion 
which had come down to their possession from antiquity, 
embraced and revered by their best men in all the honorable 
ages of the past ; a religion which stood allied with the com- 
mon interests of the society at large, and incorporated into 
the very structure of the government, supported by all the 

u First Apology, cc. 6 and 13. 15 Gibbon's Rome, i, 591. ™2 Cor. vi, 14, 15. 



354 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

military power of the empire, of which religion the emperor 
was himself chief high priest, — when they saw, in their view, 
this ancient religion confronted and antagonized by this 
upstart faith which they regarded as " a deadly superstition," 
which was without an antiquity, without an army, without a 
nation, and without empire, yet so aggressive as to demand 
the overthrow of everything which had been held by them to 
be sacred ; demanding the downfall of the old faith itself, the 
destruction of every magnificent temple, the overthrow of 
every altar, the abolition of every priest, and the abandonment 
of every service, we need not feel surprised at the profound 
amazement and disgust entertained by the heathen that found 
expression in their various epithets : " The new and deceitful 
superstition" by Suetonius; the "infatuation" and "crime" 
of the "gentle Pliny;" "the madness" of Epictetus and 
Julian, and the "barbarian temerity" of Porphyry. Nor is it 
to be so much wondered at that the Emperor Julian, whose 
susceptibilities had been so deeply offended, should taunt the 
Christians of Antioch by saying : 

' ' I suppose you are very happy because you have renounced all 
kinds of servitude; first to the gods, then to the laws, and lastly to me 
who am the guardian of the laws." 17 

Nevertheless it was as absurd as it was sincere, that he 

again wrote : 

" You miserable people, at the same time that ye refuse to worship 
the shield that fell down from Jupiter, and is preserved by us . . . 
as a certain pledge of the perpetual government of our city, . . . 
you, who are so very unhappy as to leave the immortal gods and go over 
to a dead Jew." 18 

II. Primitive Christians Blameless in Character. 

That the early Christians exampled blameless 

§251. Afflrma- J L 

tions by lives can not be denied upon the evidence of 
Adversaries. higtoiy> TMs fact could be thoroughly attested 

upon the witness of their enemies who were their contem- 

17 Mispogon, cited by Lard, vii, 647. ™Id. vii, 630. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 355 

poraries. A few testimonies taken from the many will illus- 
trate the purity and nobility of the primitive Christian char- 
acter. 

1. Pliny : Referring to those who were arrested and 
brought before his tribunal for punishment, he says : 

" They declared that the whole of their guilt or error was that they 
were accustomed to meet on a stated day before it was light and sing a 
hymn of praise to Christ as God, to bind themselves by an oath not for 
the perpetration of any wickedness, but that they would not commit 
any theft, robbery or adultery, or violate their word, or refuse when 
called upon to restore anything committed to their trust. After this, 
they were accustomed to separate, and then reassemble to eat in 
common a harmless meal. Even this they ceased to do after my edict, 
in which, agreeable to your commands, I forbade the meeting of secret 
assemblies." 19 

2. Lucian: "They [the Christians] have a sovereign contempt for 
all the things of this world, and look upon them as common ; and trust 
one another with them without any particular security." Referring to 
one Peregrinus, he adds: "The Christians were much grieved for his im- 
prisonment, and tried all ways to procure his liberty. Not being able to 
effect that, they did all sorts of kind offices, and that not in a care- 
less manner, but with the greatest assiduity ; for even betimes in the 
morning . . . some of the chief of their men . . . would get 
into the prison, and stay a whole night there with him. There they had 
a good supper together, and their sacred discourses." 20 

3. Julian: "For it having so happened, I suppose, that the poor 
were neglected by our priests, the impious Galileans, observing this, 
have addicted themselves to this kind of humanity ; and by the show 
of such good offices have recommended the worst things. For beginning 
with love-feasts and ■ the ministry of the tables/ 21 as they call it — for 
not only the name, but the thing also is common among them — they 
have drawn away the faithful to impiety." 22 

4. The unknown Arabic Writer : "We know that the people called 
Christians founded their religion in parables and miracles. In moral 
training, we see them in nowise inferior to the philosophers. They 
practice celibacy, as do many of the women ; in diet they are abstemious ; 
in fasting and prayers assiduous ; they injure no one. In the practice of 
virtue they surpass the philosophers ; in probity, in continence, in genu- 
ine performance of miracles, they infinitely excel them." 23 

5. Aristides: " On this account they do not commit adultery nor 
fornication ; they do not bear false witness ; they do not deny a deposit, 

is Letter to Trajan. 2 ° Cited in Lard, vii, 280. » Acts, vi. 2. 

22 Oration directing priests, Lard, vii, 645, 646. 

23 Smith and Wace's Diet, of Christ. Biography. 



356 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



nor covet that which is not theirs. They honor father ancUmothter-, they 

do good to those who are their neighbors ; and when they are judges 

they judge uprightly, and do not worship idols in the form 

§ 252. Conflr- of man . an( j w h a t ever they do not wish others should do 

Adherents. *° them, they do not practice toward any one. And 

they do not eat the meal of idol sacrifices, for they are 

undefiled ; and those that grieve them, they comfort and make them 

their friends ; and they do good to their enemies They do 

not worship strange gods, and they walk in humility and kindness ; 
and falsehood is not found among them, and they love one another ; and 
from the widows they do not turn away their countenance ; and they 
rescue the orphan from him who does him violence ; and he who has, 
gives to him that has not, without grudging; and when they see a 
stranger, they bring him to their dwelling, and rejoice over him as over 
a true brother ; for they do not call brothers those who are brothers 
after the flesh, but those who are in the spirit and in God. 

" But when any of their poor passes away from the world, and any 
of them sees him, then he provides for his family according to his 
ability ; and if he hears that any of their number is imprisoned or op- 
pressed for the name of their Messiah, all of them provide for his 
needs, and if it is possible that he may be delivered, they deliver him. 
And if there is among them a man that is poor, and they have an 
abundance of necessaries, they fast two and three days that they may 
supply the needy with food. And they observe scrupulously the com- 
mands of their Messiah ; they live honestly and soberly as the Lord 
their God commanded them. Every morning, and at all hours, on 
account of the goodness of God toward them, they praise and laud 
him." 24 

6. Apollonius : " We have no part at all in dissolute desires, nor 
do we allow impure sights, nor a lewd glance, nor an ear that listens to 
evil, lest our souls be wounded thereby. For he [Jesus] taught us to 
pacify anger ; to moderate desire ; to abate and diminish appetite ; to 
put away sorrow ; to take part in pity ; to increase love ; to cast away 
vainglory ; to abstain from taking vengeance, not to be vindictive ; to 
despise death, not indeed out of lawlessness, but as bearing with the 
lawless; to obey the laws of God; to reverence rulers; to worship 
God ; to intrust the spirit to the immortal God ; to look forward to judg- 
ment after death ; to expect reward after the resurrection to be given 
by God to those who have lived in piety. Teaching all this by word 
and deed, along with great firmness, and glorified by all for the bene- 
fits which he conferred on them, he [Jesus] was slain at last, as were 
before him philosophers and just men. For the just are seen to be a 
cause of offense to the unjust." 26 

7. Teachings of the Apostles: "Thou shalt do no murder; thou 

24 Apology of Aristides. 

25 Apology , cc. 26, 37, 38; Conybeare's Monuments of Early Christianity, 1894. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 357 

shalt not commit adultery ; thou shalt not corrupt boys ; thou shalt not 
commit fornication ; thou shalt not steal ; thou shalt not deal in 
magic ; thou shalt do no sorcery ; thou shalt not murder a child by abor- 
tion, nor kill them when born ; thou shalt not covet thy neighbors' 
goods ; thou shalt not perjure thyself ; thou shalt not bear false wit- 
ness ; thou shalt not speak evil ; thou shalt not cherish a grudge ; thou 
shalt not be double-minded, nor double-tongued, for the double 
tongue is a snare of death. Thy word shalt not be false or empty, but 
fulfilled by action. Thou shalt not be avaricious, nor a plunderer, nor 
a hypocrite, nor ill-tempered, nor proud. Thou shalt not entertain an 
evil design against thy neighbor. Thou shalt not hate any man; 
but some thou shalt reprove, and for others thou shalt pray ; and 
others thou shalt love more than thy life." 26 

The ground already traversed evidences the fact that two 
classes of religious opinions had appeared in the world, and 
they were radically opposed to each other. The one was an 
old system of idolatory, the other was the new system of 
Christianity. They were in nature mutually antagonistic. In 
the one case it was insisted that the antiquity of the system, 
supported as it was by the power of the State, was entitled to 
the right either to coerce the human conscience or extermi- 
nate the Christian subject, because Christianity was an 
"unlawful religion" 27 and the common watchword of the 
Eomans against the Christians was, "It is not lawful that you 
should exist."® On the other hand, it was claimed, justly, that 
the rights of conscience for the worship of God were deeply 
implanted in the human spirit by the Creator, and inhered in 
him as an inalienable right. 29 This issue naturally, if not 
inevitably, led to private hate on the one part and to open 
persecution. Nevertheless, it should not be overlooked, that 
when the adversaries had said the worst they had to say 
respecting the character and conduct of the Christians, it 
was a concession that they whom they sought to exterminate 
for their faith had been living pure and blameless lives. 
This stands confirmed by the open protests before the magis- 
trates of the government, whose words were a recognized 

w Didache, c. 2. « " Religio illicta." 

» "Non licet esse vos," cited by Tertullian. »» Acts, iv, 19, 20; xxiii, 1, 2. 



358 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

challenge for evidence to the contrary of their statements. 
There yet remain to be considered 

III. The Persistent Persecutions of the Christians. 

When Jesus founded the Christian religion in the world, 

.he gave utterance to the pathetic prediction 

tion of that those who would become his disciples must 

take up their cross and follow him. They must 

expect that persecutions would await them. He said: 

"In the world ye have tribulation." 30 "They will lay their hands 
on you, and will persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and 
prisons ; bringing you before kings and governors for my name's sake. 
Ye shall be delivered up even by parents and brethren, and kinsfolk and 
friends ; and some of you will they cause to be put to death. And ye 
shall be hated of all men for my name's sake." 31 " Remember the word 
that I said unto you: A servant is not greater than his Lord. If they 
have persecuted me, they will also persecute you." 32 

How this prediction was realized in the expe- 

§ 254. Experi- ... r 

ence of the rience of the apostles is related in what follows. 

Apostles. -r> -, 

Paul says : 

" For I think God hath set forth us the apostles last of all, as men 
doomed to death ; for we are made a spectacle unto the world, and to 
angels, and to men." 33 "And now, behold, I go bound in the spirit unto 
Jerusalem, not knowing the things that shall befall me there ; save only 
that the Holy Ghost testifieth unto me in every city, saying that bonds 
and afflictions abide me. But I hold not my life of any account as dear 
unto myself, so that I may accomplish my course, and the ministry 
which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace 
of God." 34 "In stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in 
deaths oft." 35 "But in all things approving ourselves as the ministers 
of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in 
stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults." 36 "We are troubled on every 
side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; perse- 
cuted, but not destroyed, . . . for we who live are always delivered 
unto death for Jesus' sake." 37 "Yea, and all that will live godly in 
Christ Jesus will suffer persecution." 38 "When we were with you, we 
told you before that ye should suffer tribulation, even as it came to 
pass." 39 "And they [the apostles] departed from the Council, rejoicing 
that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the Name." 40 

30Johnxvi,33. 31 Luke xxl, 12, 16, 17. 3J John xv, 20. aaicor. iv, 9. 

3* Acts xx, 22-24. 3»2 Cor. xi, 23. 36 Ib. vi, 4, 5. w lb. Iv, 8-10. 

382 Tim. ill, 12. 8S » 1 Thess. iii, 3, 4. «Actsv, 41. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 359 

Peter adds : 

" Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial among you, 
which cometh upon you to prove you, as though a strange thing hap- 
pened unto you ; but inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings, 
rejoice, that at the revelation of his glory also ye may rejoice with 
exceeding great joy. If ye are reproached for the name of Christ, 
blessed are ye, because [the Spirit] of glory and the Spirit of God 
resteth upon you. For let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a 
thief, or as an evil-doer, or as a meddler in other men's matters ; but if 
any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him 
glorify God in this Name." 41 

These citations sufficiently indicate both the cruelties and 
persecutions to which the primitive Christians were exposed 
and subiected, and the tone and trend of their onBB „ 

J ' §255. Forti- 

minds in the endurance of these trials. Their tude of the 
noble patience and fortitude, illustrated in their 
sufferings endured, touched even the heathen multitude with 
compassion. That they were persecuted exclusively for their 
faith in Christ is not only corroborated, but particularized and 
amplified in the testimonies of the heathen themselves, who 
were men of the highest standing among the heathen. 

As the first Christians were Jewish Christians, whose center 
was Jerusalem, where Jesus was recently crucified, the Jewish 
people came to regard the Christians, not as a sect of the Jews, 
but as those who had openly apostatized from the ancient 
faith of the Church ; and accordingly they transferred to the 
followers of Christ all the hate and malice which ruled when 
they put him to death. Hence there were 
I. Jewish Persecutions. 

After the destruction of Jerusalem in A. D. 70, the Sanhe- 
drin of the Jews continued its sessions at Jabneh, whose 
Greek name was Jamnia, called, in the Talmud, _ „ 

' ' ' §256. TheTal- 

Jafna. It was located near the Mediterranean mudic 
Sea, about eleven miles south of Joppa. The 
particulars following illustrate the spirit and legislation which 
prevailed with reference to the Christians, who were odiously 

« 1 Pet. iv, 12-16. 



360 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

named as identified with the Gentiles. The Sanhedrin passed 

laws especially placing Christians in the same hateful relations 

in their regards as the Samaritans, ® persecuting them socially, 

in business relations, and in religion. In Talmudic literature 

is a Jewish prayer intended to be offered against all Christians, 

but specially against all Jewish Christians. It was signed by 

the president of the Sanhedrin, named Gamaliel II. The 

Jewish Christians were called Minim® meaning " Heretics" 

This prayer reads : 

" O let the slanderers have no hope ! Let the wicked be annihilated 
speedily, and all the tyrants be cut off quickly! Humble thou them in 
haste in our days! Blessed art thou, O Lord, who destroyest our 
enemies l" It was further enjoined: "If the reader of the prayer make 
a mistake, or become confused in reading, another shall instantly rise 
up instead, and cry to heaven for a curse upon the Gentiles." ** 

The following details are extracted from the unexpurgated 
edition of the Talmud: 

(1.) It is forbidden to buy meat, bread or wine from Jewish Chris- 
tians, or to eat or drink with them in their own houses ; and they shall 
not have dealings of trust with them. 

(2.) The Christian Liturgy is to be put in ban [i. e., condemned 
under death penalty], like books of magic. 

(3.) Every dealer in business, and every service, is strictly forbid- 
den; and also no wonder-cure [miracle-cure] shall be received from 
them, in which the Christian Jews use the name of Jesus Christ, whether 
a sick person, or an animal. 

(4.) It is strictly forbidden to use any medicine received from Chris- 
tians, lest it shall convert him [to Christianity]. 45 

(5.) A Gentile who employs himself in the law is guilty of death. 
He is not to employ himself except in the Seven Commandments, which 
belong to the Gentiles. And thus a Gentile who keeps a Sabbath-day, 
though it be one of the week-days, if he make it to himself a Sabbath, 
is guilty of death. . . . But if he employs himself in the law or 
keeps the Sabbath, or makes an innovation, he is to be beaten and pun- 
ished, and informed that he is guilty of death ; but he is not to be 
killed." 46 

(6.) A Noahite [i. e., Gentile] who has become a proselyte, and has 
been circumcised and baptized, and afterwards wishes to return from 

« Comp. John viii, 48, and iv, 9. « D" J'D 

"Hilchoth Tphillah, c. ii, a; and Daily Prayers in Synag., fol. 36, of Prayer- 
Booh, Part ii, p. 127. 

45 Talmud. Tosifta Chulin, e. 2, Avondah Sara, 17, a; 27, b; Chulin, 23, a and b. 

46 Hilchoth Melachim, c. x, 9; Sanhedr, fol. 59, col. 1. See also Edersheim's 
Jesus the Messiah, Vol. I, p. 93. 



The Persecutions of the Primative Christians. 361 

the Lord, and to be only a sojourning proselyte as he was before, is not 
to be listened to ; on the contrary, either let him be an Israelite in 
everything, or let him be put to death." 47 

(7.) A Gentile woman is not to be delivered upon the [Jewish] 
Sabbath-day, not even for payment ; neither is the enmity to be regarded. 
It is not to be done, even if no profanation of the Sabbath is implied. 48 

II. Eoman Persecutions. 
Among Roman writers of fame who were most active in 
creating a public sentiment against the Christians, inciting 
the populace to acts of violence, and instigating 

r r ' & & § 257. Liter- 

the imperial and local government to persecu- ary Persecu- 
tion, were Porphyry, who wrote fifteen books for 
that purpose, and Hierocles, whom Lactantius mentions as 
being both "a persecutor, and an adviser of persecution." 
Lucian and Celsus were conspicuous for their hostility; the 
former furnishing in general the ground of opposition, and 
the latter illustrating the spirit engendered in what is com- 
monly designated "the ten persecutions" of the Christians. 

a) Lucian wrote: "These miserable men have no doubt that they 
shall be immortal and live forever; therefore they contemn death, and 
many surrender themselves to sufferings. Moreover, their first Law- 
giver has taught them that they were all brethren when once they had 
turned and renounced the gods of the Greeks, and worshiped that Master 
of theirs who was crucified, and engage to live according to his laws." 49 

/3) Celsus wrote : " They must make their choice between two 
alternatives ; if they refuse to render due service to the gods, and to 
respect those who are set over the service, let them not come to manhood, 
or marry wives or have children, or indeed take any share in the affairs of 
life; but let them depart hence with all speed, and leave no posterity behind 
them, that such a race may become extinct from the face of the earth. " 50 

Roman historians testify unequivocally to the open hostil- 
ity of emperors, led bv Nero, who exercised their 

J r , J § 258. Impe- 

power to exterminate the Christian religion, or rial Persecu- 
force those who embraced it to become idolaters. tlons * 
In the year 64, Nero ordered that the city of Rome should be 
set on fire in order that he might rebuild it with marble in 
palatial magnificence. To escape the fury of the populace, 

« Hilchoth Melach. c. x, 3. « Hil. Melach. ii, 12. 

*>Lard. vii, 280. ^Origen contra Celsum, viil, 55. 



362 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

which threatened his life for this outrage on the people 
and imperial crime against society, he basely attributed his 
own guilt to the defenseless Christians who were his loyal 
subjects. He proceeded to inflict the most exquisite tortures 
upon them as a class, who were entirely innocent, as the fol- 
lowing testimonies prove beyond recall. Of this conflagra- 
tion and the facts cited, we have ample evidence from the 
writings of several famous historians. 

1. Tacitus: "Nero falsely charged the guilt, and punished with the 
most exquisite torture, the persons . . . commonly called Chris- 
tians. . . . A vast number were convicted, not so much of the crime 
of incendiarism as that of hatred of the human race. 51 And in their 
deaths they were made the subjects of sport ; for they were wrapped in 
the hides of beasts and torn to pieces by dogs, or nailed to crosses, or set 
on fire, and, when the day declined, were burned alive to serve for noc- 
turnal lights. 62 Nero offered his own gardens for the spectacle, and also 
exhibited a chariot on the occasion ; and now mingling with the crowd 
in the dress of a charioteer, now actually holding the reins. Whence 
arose a feeling of compassion for the sufferers, though justly held to be 
odious, because they seemed not to be cut off for the public good, but as the 
victims of the ferocity of one man." 5 * 

2. Suetonius : " Moreover, he spared neither the people of Eome, nor 
the capital of his country. . . . He pretended to be disgusted with 
the old buildings and the narrow and winding streets ; he set the city on 
fire so openly, that many of consular rank caught his own household 
servants on their property with tow and torches, but durst not meddle 
with them. There being near his Golden House some granaries, the site 
of which he exceedingly coveted, they were battered as if with ma- 
chines of war, and set on fire, the walls being built of stone. During six 
days and seven nights this terrible devastation continued, the people 
being obliged to fly to the tombs and monuments for lodging and shel- 
ter. . . . This fire he beheld from a tower in the house of Maecenas, 
and being greatly delighted, as he said, with the beautiful effects of the 
conflagration, he sung a poem on the ruin of Troy, in the tragic dress he 
used on the stage." M " He likewise inflicted punishments on the Chris- 
tians, a sort of people who held a new and impious superstition." 55 

^"Odio humani generis," an ambiguous expression, which Thiersch and 
others understand to read the hatred of mankind towards the Christians. 

52 The old Scholiast contains two interesting passages referring to this cir- 
cumstance: "In the public shows of Nero, living men were burnt; for he 
ordered them to be covered with wax that they might give light tc the spec- 
tators." " He covered certain mischievous men with pitch and paper and wax, 
and then commanded fire to be applied to them that they might burn." 

ss Annals, xv, 44. M Lives of the Tivelve Caesars, Nero, c. 38. 

55 lb. c. 16. Superstitionis novce el maleficaz," the last word referring to witch- 
craft or enchantment; i. e., Christian miracles. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 363 

Speaking of the Emperor Claudius, Suetonius says: "He banished 
from Rome all the Jews, who were continually making disturbances at 
the instigation of one Chrestus " [Ohrestus = Ghristus = Christ]. 56 

Such were the sufferings inflicted upon the Christians for 

the crime of being good. Recently an attempt was made to 

show that the Annals of Tacitus are a forgery of 

to J § 259. Testi- 

one Pogio Bracciolini, an Italian, dating in the monies con- 
fifteenth century. But this theory has been rmator y- 
thoroughly refuted, and is now abandoned. The genuineness 
of the work has been substantiated by the agreement of 
minute details with coins of that date, and inscriptions dis- 
covered since that time. 57 There is also to be added the cor- 
roborative testimony of Jerome, who mentions the existence of 
the Annals of Tacitus in his day. But we have the strong con- 
firming testimony of the infidel historian, Edward Gibbon, 
who indorses the testimony of Tacitus touching the inflictions 
upon the Christians on account of the burning of Rome, in 
this language : 

a) "The most skeptical criticism is obliged to respect the truth of 
this extraordinary fact [i. e., the sufferings of the Christians] and the 
integrity of this celebrated passage of Tacitus. The former [the truth] 
is confirmed by the diligent and accurate Suetonius, who mentions the 
punishment which Nero inflicted on the Christians, a sect of men who 
embraced a 'new and criminal superstition/ The latter [the integrity 
of the passage] may be proved by the consent of the most ancient manu- 
scripts, by the inimitable character of the style of Tacitus, by the repu- 
tation which guarded his text from the interpolations/' etc. 58 

j3) Sulpicius Severus, an historian of the Christian Church 
who wrote in elegant style in the fourth century, substantiates 
again the facts narrated by Tacitus. He says: 

"In the meantime the number of the Christians was greatly in- 
creased. There happened a fire at Rome while Nero was at Antium ; 
nevertheless, the general opinion of all men casts the blame of the fire 
upon the emperor [himself]. And it was supposed that his aim therein 
was that he might have the glory of raising the city again in greater 
splendor. Nor could he by any means suppress the common rumor that 
the fire was owing to his orders. He therefore endeavored to cast the 

56 Lives of the Twelve CoBsars, Claudius, c. 25. Hence Paul met Aquila at Cor- 
inth, " with his wife Priscilla, because that Claudius had commanded all the Jews to 
depart from Rome." ( Acts xviii, 1, 2. ) This also excluded the Christian Jews. 

57 See Cyclop. Brit, under Tacitus. 

58 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Millman's (American) ed., Vol.1, 602. 



364 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

reproach of it upon the Christians. And exquisite tortures were in- 
flicted upon innocent men ; and, moreover, new kinds of death were in- 
vented. Some were tied up in the skins of wild beasts, that they might 
be worried to death by dogs. Many were crucified. Others were 
burned to death, and they were set up as lights in the night-time. This 
was the beginning of the persecutions of the Christians. Afterwards the 
profession of the Christian religion was prohibited by the laws, and edicts 
were published that no man might be a Christian. At that time Paul and 
Peter were condemned to death. The former was beheaded ; Peter was 
crucified." 59 

7) Tertullian says: "Consult your histories ; you will find that Nero 
was the first who assailed with the imperial sword the Christian sect, 
making progress then especially at Rome. But we glory in having our 
condemnation hallowed by the hostility of such a wretch. For any one 
who knows him can understand that, not excepting as being of singular 
excellence, did any thing bring on it Nero's condemnation.' ' Chris- 
tianity " under Nero was ruthlessly condemned ; and you may weigh its 
worth and character, even from the person of its persecutor. If that 
prince was a pious man, then the Christians are impious ; if he was 
just, if he was pure, then Christians are unjust and impure ; if he was 
not a public enemy, we are enemies of our country. What sort of men 
we are our prosecutor shows, since he of course punished that which 
produced hostility to himself." 60 

8) A Monumental Inscription in Portugal dedicated to 
Nero furnishes an added interest, as well as a strong confir- 
mation, in regard to the procedures of that emperor against 
the Christians. The monument celebrates his name on 
account of his success in clearing that country of two enor- 
mous evils, "Kobbers and Christians!" A translation of the 
inscription is this: 

TO NERO CLAUDIUS CAESAR 

AUGUSTUS HIGH PRIEST 

FOR CLEARING THE PROVINCE 

OF ROBBERS, AND THOSE 

WHO TAUGHT MANKIND 

A NEW SUPERSTITION. * 



*Nekoni. Cl. Caes. Aug. Pont. Max. Ob. Proving. Lathronib. Et # 
His. Qui, Novam. Generi. Hum. Superstition. Inoulab. Purgatam. This 
monument no longer exists, but is inserted on the authority of "Ap. Gru- 
ter, p. 239." See Lardner's Works, vi, 623. Its disappearance could not prove it to 
he spurious, and a public monument could not possibly be fraudulently imposed 
upon a given community and civilization without being questioned from the 
first. 

69 Sacred Hist., Lib. ii, c. 41, 29. 6° Apology, c. 5 ; and Ad Nationes, Lib., i, c.7. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 365 

e) Edward Gibbon, the skeptical historian of Rome, gives 
his testimony in reference to some of the earlier imperial per- 
secutors of the Christians. He says : 

"The Annals of the emperors exhibit a strong and various picture 
of human nature, which we shall vainly seek among the mixed and 
doubtful characters of modern history. In the conduct of these mon- 
archs we may trace the utmost lines of vice and virtue ; the most exalted 
perfection and the meanest degeneracy of our own species. The Golden 
Age of Trajan and the Antonines had been preceded by an Age of Iron. 
It is almost superfluous to enumerate the unworthy successors of 
Augustus. Their unparalleled vices, and the splendid theater on which they 
acted, have saved them from oblivion. The dark and unrelenting Tiberius, 
the furious Caligula, the feeble Claudius, the profligate and cruel Nero, 
the beastly Vitellius, and the timid and inhuman Domitian, are condemned 
to everlasting infamy. During fourscore years Rome groaned beneath 
an unremitting tyranny, which exterminated the most ancient families 
of the Republic, and was fatal to almost every virtue and every talent 
that arose in that unhappy period." 61 

From his province as proconsul of Pontus and 
Bithynia, Pliny the younger wrote to the Em- cution under 

rp - -, . j. , , . Caius Pliny. 

peror Irajan for advice referring to his proper 
treatment of the Christians. Among other particulars con- 
tained in this official letter are the following : 

" I have pursued this course towards those who have been brought 
before me as Christians. I asked them whether they were Christians ; if 
they confessed [that they were] I repeated the question the second and 
a third time, adding threats of punishment. If they still persevered, / 
ordered them to be led away to punishment; for I could not doubt, whatever the 
nature of their profession might be, that a stubborn and unyielding obsti- 
nacy certainly deserved to be punished [with death] ! There were others 
also under like infatuation. . . . But the crime spread, as is wont 
to happen while the persecutions were going on. . . . An information 
was presented to me without any name subscribed, accusing a large 
number of persons who denied that they were Christians or ever had 
been. They repeated after me an invocation of the gods, and with wine and 
frankincense made supplication to your statue, which I had ordered to be 
brought in for this purpose, together with the statues of the deities. Moreover, 
they reviled the name of Christ. Whereas those who are truly Christians, it is 
said, can not be forced to do any of these things. I thought, therefore, that 
they ought to be discharged. Others were named by an informer, who at 
first confessed themselves Christians, but afterwards denied it. The 
rest affirmed that they had been Christians, but they had renounced 

« Roman Empire, i, 130, 131. 



366 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



their error. . . . They all did homage to your statue and the images 
of the gods, and at the same time reviled the name of Christ. ... It 
is easy to imagine what a multitude of men might be reclaimed, if par- 
don should be offered to those who repent [of having been Christians]." 62 
The Emperor Trajan's Rescript to Pliny Junior. 

" Trajanus Plinio, S. 

"Trajan to Pliny wisheth health and happiness. You have taken 

the right course, my dear Pliny, in your proceedings with those 

who have been brought before you as Christians ; for it 

§ 261. Rescript ig i m p 0SS ibi e to establish any one rule that shall hold uni- 

Pliny. versally. They are not to be sought for. If any are 

brought before you, and are convicted [for being Chris- 
tians] they ought to be punished. However, he that denies his being a 
Christian, and makes it evident in fact — that is, by supplicating to our 
gods — though he be suspected to have been formerly , let him be par- 
doned upon repentance. But in no case of any crime whatever, may a 
bill of information be received without being signed by him who pre- 
sents it ; for that would be a dangerous precedent, and unworthy of 
my government. 5 ' 63 

The Emperor Hadrian's* Rescript to Serenius Granianus, 

Who was proconsul of Asia, and had written to the emperor : " It seems to 

me unjust that the Christians should be put to death only to 

§ 262. Rescript gratify the clamor of the people, without trial, and without 

_ *° any crime proved against them" As Minucius Fundanus, 

meantime had succeeded to the proconsulship of 

Granianus, the emperor's Rescript was addressed to him as follows: 

"It seems to me that this is an affair which ought not to be passed 
over without examination if it were only to prevent disturbances being 
made among the people, and that room may not be left for informers 
to practice their wicked arts. If, therefore, the people of the province 
will appear publicly, and in a legal way, charge the Christians, that 
they may answer for themselves in court, and not proceed [against 
them] by importunate demands only, and loud clamors, for it is 
much the better method if any one bring accusations, that you should 
examine them — if any one shall accuse and bring out anything con- 
trary to the law, do you determine according to the nature of the crime. 
But, by Hercules ! if the charge is only a calumny, do you take care to 
punish the author of it with the severity it deserves." 64 

263 Perse- The Em P eror Diocletian (284-305), though 
cution of the son of a slave, proved to be in the main an 
Diocletian, a ^ e an d judicious ruler, but he was a man of 

superstition and a despot. The Coptic Churches of Egypt 

* Hadrian was emperor A. D. 117-138. 

62 See Excursus F. for the letter complete. 63 Lib. x, 98. 

6 * Eusebius, Eccl. Hist, iv, cc. 8, 9. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 367 

and Abyssinia reckon the u Era of Martyrs" as beginning 
with his reign. Dr. Schaff says : 

"In 303, Diocletian issued in rapid succession three edicts, each 
more severe than its predecessor. Maximian issued the fourth, the 
worst of all, April 30, 304. Christian churches were to be destroyed ; 
all copies of the Bible were to be burned ; all Christians were to be 
deprived of all public offices and civil rights; and at last, without 
exception, were to sacrifice to the gods, upon pain of death." " The 
persecution began on the twenty-third of February, 303, the feast of 
the Terminalia (as if to make an end of the Christian sect), with the 
destruction of the magnificent church in Nicomedia, and soon spread 
over the whole Roman Empire, except Gaul, Britain and Spain." 65 

Besides the open confession of persecution by 
the enemies of Christianity, it is due the suffer- getic connr- 
ing victims of their ferocity that they should be 
heard in their own defense. In his Dialogue with Tryjpho the 
Jew, the writer says : 

a) Justin Martyr: "These things have happened to you in fairness 
and justice ; for you have slain the Just One and his prophets before 
him, and you have rejected those who hope in him, . . . cursing in 
your synagogues those who believe on Christ." " For other nations have 
not inflicted on us and on Christ this wrong to such an extent as you 
have, who in very deed are the authors of the prejudice against the 
Just One and us who hold by him." n 

/3) Epistle to Diognetus : 'Are not all [the gods] deaf and blind? Are 
they not soulless, senseless, motionless ? Do they not all rot and decay ? 
These things ye call gods ; to these ye [heathen] are slaves ; these ye 
worship; and ye end by becoming altogether like them. Therefore ye 
hate the Christians, because they do not consider these to be gods. For do 
not ye yourselves who now regard and worship them, much more despise 
them? ,} The Christians "obey the laws, and they surpass the laws in 
their own lives. They love all men, and they are persecuted by all. 
They are ignored, and yet they are condemned. They are put to death, 
and yet they are endued with life. . . . They are evil spoken of, and 
yet they are vindicated. They are reviled, and they bless ; they are 
insulted, and [yet] they respect. Doing good, they are punished as 
evil-doers. . . . War is waged against them as aliens by the Jews, 
and persecution is carried on against them by the Greeks ; and yet those 
that hate them can not tell the reason of their hostility; . . . thrown to 
wild beasts that they may deny the Lord, and yet are not overcome." 8T 

KHist. Christ. Ch. ii, 66, 67. « 6 Dialogue, cc. 16, 17. 

« Bp. Llghtfoot's Apos. Fathers, §§ 2, 5, 7. 
24 



368 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

7) Apollonius: Jesus "was slain, as were also before him philoso- 
phers and just men. For the just are seen to be a cause of offense to the 
unjust." ^ 

8) Tertullian :"0 blasphemy, bordering on martyrdom, which now 
attests me to be a Christian, while for that very account detests me. 
The cursing of a well-maintained discipline is a blessing of the name." 69 
' ' We lay this before you as the first ground on which we urge that your 
hatred of the name ' Christian' is unjust." " You think the Christian 
a man of crime, an enemy of the gods, of the emperor, of the laws, of 
good morals, of all nature ; yet you compel him to deny, that you may 
acquit him, which without his denial you could not do. You play fast- 
and-loose with the laws. ... In our case, you are either ashamed or 
unwilling to mention the name of our crimes. If to be called ' a Christian ' 
does not imply any crime, the name is surely very hateful when that of 
itself is made a crime." 70 "But now without any sifting or knowl- 
edge . . . the mere name is made a matter of accusation ; the mere 
name is assailed, and a sound alone brings condemnation both on a sect 
and its Author, while of both you are ignorant, [but] because they have 
such and such a designation, not because they are convicted of any 
wrong." n " When you sternly lay it down in your sentences, ' It is not 
lawful for you [Christians] to exist,' and with unhesitating rigor you 
enjoin this to be carried out, you exhibit the violence and unjust dom- 
ination of mere tyranny, if you deny a thing to be lawful simply on the 
ground that you wish it to be unlawful, not because it ought to be." 72 
" For but lately, in condemning a Christian to the leno rather than the 
leo, you made confession that a taint on our purity is considered among 
us something more terrible than any punishment, and any death." 73 

Two eminent Roman historians, each independently of the 

other, have completely exonerated the Christians at Eome of 

,. „ . the charge of incendiarism in the great confla- 

§265. Review to & 

of gration in the year 64, which was made by Nero 

the occasion of the first great persecution on 
the part of the Romans. Edward Gibbon, Sulpicius Severus, 
and Tertullian unqualifiedly confirm their statements of the 
main facts, and add many details. All are agreed in opinion, 
and also reflect the popular belief of the contemporaries of 
the event, that the firing of Rome was the crime of one man, 
and that was the crime of Eero the Emperor himself. This 

•» Monuments of Early Christianity, c. 46. 69 Idolatry, c. 14. 

™ Apology before the Rom. Senate, cc. 1, 2. *i lb. c. 3, close. ""lb. c, 4. 
73 16. c, 50. " Leno . . . leo "=subjected to the seducer to be debauched, or 
to the lion to be devoured. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 369 

itself justifies the statement of Tacitus, that in consequence 
of the terrible inflictions imposed upon the innocent Chris- 
tians, there arose among the spectators of their sufferings " a 
feeling of compassion toward the sufferers because they seemed 
not to be cut off for the public good, but as the victims of the 
ferocity of one man" In the nature of the case but few per- 
sons could conspire together in the work of incendiarism, so 
that in no event could that accusation be brought against the 
whole body of Christians. Besides, the monumental evidence 
in the province of Portugal proves how the persecution, inau- 
gurated by the emperor, spread to the different and remote 
parts of the empire, seeking to exterminate the people who 
were Christians. An official correspondence, here noted, con- 
ducted between Pliny and the Emperor Trajan, relates exclu- 
sively to the persecution of the Christians, and describes how 
it shall be conducted. The Christian religion itself is called 
and treated as " a crime." Loyalty to Christ was esteemed to 
be disloyalty to the government. The fortitude and faithful- 
ness of Christians under trial were regarded as a contumacious 
"unyielding obstinacy" towards the proconsul himself, which 
he would not brook, but condemned as worthy of death. He 
doubts " whether repentance entitled to pardon," and "whether 
to renounce his error shall avail nothing for him who had once 
been a Christian; whether the [mere] name itself without any 
crime [attaching] should subject to punishment." For as 
Professor W. M. Kamsay aptly remarks, "Pliny and Trajan 
treat them [Christians] as outlaws and brigands, and punish 
them without reference to crimes." " Pliny and Trajan both 
assume that Christianity is itself a crime deserving of death." 74 
Serenius Granianus, another proconsul of Asia, protests vigor- 
ously against the recent departure from Roman law and justice 
in that, in his province, Christians had been put to death 
without the preferring of charges, without law, without trial, 
without proof, and without defense, on the mere clamors of 

74 The Church in the Roman Empire, pp. 245, 248. 



370 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

the fierce and fanatical populace. Diocletian, who reigned 

conjointly with Maximian (A. D. 292-305), inaugurated a 

persecution of ten years or more, during which churches were 

burned down, the sacred books were burned up, innocent men 

proscribed, and many martyrs made at the stake. Edward 

Gibbon admits that — 

"The ancient apologists of Christianity have censured with equal 
truth and severity the irregular conduct of their persecutors, who, con- 
trary to every principle of judicial proceeding, admitted the use of 
torture in order to obtain, not a confession, but a denial of the crime, 
which was the object of their inquiry." 

Notwithstanding, he becomes apologist for the persecutors 
in the same paragraph. He insists that those who confessed 
that they were Christians, or were so attested by others, " still 
retained in their own power the alternative of life and death ; " 
that the magistrate " was persuaded that he offered them an 
easy pardon, since if they consented to cast a few grains of 
incense upon the altar, they were dismissed from the tribunal 
in safety and with applause!" 75 But according to the evi. 
dence adduced, the only crime confessed or attested by others 
was that they were Christians; that they refused to sacrifice 
to the heathen gods, or burn incense to the statue of Caesar, 
and would not curse the name of Christ their Redeemer. 76 
The very suggestion of such a surrender to the superstitious 
heathen is unworthy of the character of the great historian. 

There were several distinctive periods or epochs in the 
history of these Christian persecutions which should be 
remarked. First, that in which the Eomans were indifferent 
to the Christian religion, and had not yet learned to discrim- 
inate it from the religion of the Jews. From their subordi- 
nation to the Romans, the Jews had granted to them and 
guaranteed the rights and customs of their religion. This 
lack of distinguishing between the religion of the two explains 
the remark of Suetonius, "Claudius banished from Rome all 



75 Decline and Fall, etc., i, 612. 

76 See Pliny's Epistle to Trajan, in Excursus B. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 371 

the Jews, who were continually making disturbances at the 
instigation of one Christ" — an obvious reference to the dis- 
putations which naturally arose between these two classes of 
the one race concerning Jesus. If it was a period of indiffer- 
ence on the part of the Romans, it was certainly a period of 
intense activity, hatred, and persecution of the Christians on 
the part of the Jews, especially in the community about 
Jerusalem. 

The second period was that in which the Christians were 
accused of most abominable crimes, — incendiarism, child- 
murder, cannibalism, and the like. The first instance which 
furnished an occasion for persecution was the great conflagra- 
tion in the year 64, which destroyed most of the city of Rome. 
The Emperor Nero charged the Christians with the crime of 
incendiarism. Tacitus unqualifiedly affirms that " Nero falsely 
charged the guilt, and punished with the most exquisite tor- 
ture, the persons . . . commonly called Christians." Sue- 
tonius openly declares that the guilt of incendiarism was the 
crime of no other than of Nero himself, whose emissaries were 
caught in the very act, and claimed to be acting under impe- 
rial orders. When his life was threatened by the infuriated 
mob, he blamed the Christians with the crime, and proceeded 
to punish them with the "exquisite torture" and burning 
alive, described by Tacitus. 

The third epoch is that in which Trajan and Pliny ruled 
as indicated. There were investigations conducted by Pliny ; 
but, so far as appears, the only offense of the Christians was 
that of hatred and hostility to mankind. The only question 
asked to be answered was, "Are you a Christian,?" It was 
the one question which Pliny asked twice and thrice in his 
investigations respecting those brought to his tribunal. No 
questions were asked about any specific acts of crime, after the 
torture of the two women called "deaconesses." The mere 
acknowledgment that they were "Christians" was the one 
sufficient thing to determine their condemnation unto death. 



372 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Without evidence or trial, they were classed with robbers and 
brigands, and treated as outlaws. 

The fourth epoch may be designated as " the Diocletian per- 
secution." Maximian ruled with him conjointly A. D. 294-305, 
when both resigned; but the persecution which they inaugu- 
rated by their edicts in 303 continued for at least ten years, 
and was exceedingly distressing. Innocent men were pro- 
scribed, their property confiscated, their persons martyred, 
their churches were destroyed, and the Christians were re- 
quired to bring forth their Scriptures and burn them publicly, 
under pain of being themselves burned. Sulpicius Severus 
says, "Never was the world more wasted by any war." The 
destruction of the Scriptures, of which, at this early date, 
there were probably but comparatively few copies in exist- 
ence, will account for the fact that we have transmitted to 
us no known Greek manuscripts of the New Testament dating 
earlier than A. D. 325. The end of this persecution brings us 
to near the time of Constantine the Great, the first Christian 
emperor. 

It may be worth while to consider more particularly what 
occasion the Christians furnished for these high-handed perse- 
cutions which looked for their extermination. 

§266. Occasion 

for The principal reasons were manifold, and to the 

ersecution. p rouc [ an ^ p OWG rf ul Eomans aggravating. The 
Christians did not hesitate to refuse absolutely to render idola- 
trous homage to the statue of the emperor ; refused to recog- 
nize or worship the heathen gods chosen by the State ; and on 
purely conscientious grounds, as a sovereign and inherent 
right, refused to execrate the Name of Christ. Moreover, 
they not only ignored the religion of the empire, but sought 
to introduce a " new " and an illegal religion in the worship 
of Jesus Christ as Creator and Lord of all. The Eomans did 
not recognize the inalienable rights of conscience in any man, 
and, as they saw it, loyalty to Christ meant disloyalty to the 
government, which was treason and punishable with death. 



The Peksecuttons of the Primitive Christians. 373 

The Roman Government and people were the more devoted 
to their own religion because it was their ancestral religion, 
and accordingly opposed resolutely whatever proposed to dis- 
place and destroy their own ancient faith. This was the more 
exasperating to them, inasmuch as Christianity was, in their 
view, the seditious offshoot from Judaism, and from a place 
regarded as the very hearthstone of a detested superstition ; 
itself "a new and mischievous superstition" which had no 
history before it, and no nation behind it, to make it respect- 
able, and which, withal, sought to elevate and impose upon 
others, as an object of worship, one who had been crucified 
between two thieves as an outlaw — a "dead Jew." 
Dr. Philip Schaff represents the situation thus: 

"The piety of Eomulus and Numa was believed to have laid the 
foundation of the power of Rome. To the favor of the deities of the 
Republic, the brilliant success of the Roman arms was attributed. . . . 
The emperor [himself] was ex officio the ponlifex maximus [high priest 
of the empire], and even an object of worship. The gods were national, 
and the eagle of Jupiter Capitolinus moved as a good genius before the 
world-conquering legions. Cicero lays down as a principle of legisla- 
tion, that no one should be allowed to worship foreign gods, unless they were 
recognized by public statute. Maecenas counseled Augustus : ' Honor the 
gods according to the custom of our ancestors, and compel others to worship 
them. Hate and punish those who bring in strange gods.'" 

" In North Africa arose the proverb : ' If God does not send rain, 
lay it on the Christians.' " "At every inundation, or drought, or famine, 
or pestilence, the fanatical populace cried, 'Away with the Atheists!' 
1 To the lions with the Christians V Persecutions were sometimes started 
by priests, jugglers, merchants, and others who derived their support 
from their idolatrous worship. These, like Demetrius of Ephesus, and 
the masters of the sorceress at Philippi, kindled the fanaticism and in- 
dignation of the mob against ' the new religion,' for its interference 
with their gains." 77 

a) Celsus wrote : " O sincere believers, you find fault with us because 

we do not recognize this individual [Jesus] as God, nor agree that he 

endured these [sufferings] for the benefit of mankind/' 78 

"If you should tell them that Jesus is not the Son of § 267 - The Wit- 

ness of 
God, but that God is the Father of all, and that he alone Persecutors. 

should be truly worshiped, they would not consent to 

discontinue their worship of him as their leader in the sedition. And 

" Hist. Christ. Church, ii, 41-44; comp. Acts xix, 24; xvl, 16. 78 eels, ii, 38. 



374 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

they call him the Son of God, not out of any extreme reverence for God, 
but from an extreme desire to extol Jesus Christ." 79 " You . . . set 
up as a God one who ended a most infamous life by a most miserable 
death/' 80 

p) Porphyry: " That man is not so much of an Atheist who neglects 
the worship of the images of the gods as he who transfers to God the 
opinions of the multitude." 81 " For since Jesus has been honored, none 
have received any public benefit from the gods." 82 " Jesus Christ is a 
man illustrious for piety, and he is more powerful than ^Esculapius 
and all the other gods." & " Christ, therefore, is not to be calumniated ; 
they should be pitied who worship him as God." M 

7) Hierocles: " That all may perceive our just and reasonable judg- 
ment, and the levity of the Christians, forasmuch as we do not esteem 
him [Apollonius] who did these things a god, but a man favored by the 
gods, . . . whereas they [the Christians], for the sake of a few 
tricks, call Jesus God ! " M 

8) Julian : When the Alexandrian Christians presented to 
the emperor a petition requesting that he would revoke his 
edict banishing their Bishop Athanasius from Egypt, the 
emperor replied : 

"By the gods, ye men of Alexandria, I am ashamed that any Alex- 
andrian should acknowledge himself a Galilean. . . . Alexander, the 
Ptolemies and other princes, their founders and patrons, were worship- 
ers of the gods ; and had not raised their city and constitution to its 
grandeur by the words of Jesus, nor by the doctrine of the hateful 
Galileans. None of these gods do ye worship ; but Jesus, whom neither 
you nor your fathers have seen, him you think to be God, the Word." ** 
"We ought to pity rather than hate men who suffer the greatest 
calamity, . . . which calamity they bring upon themselves for for- 
saking the immortal gods, betaking themselves to dead men." 87 " But 
you love Christ, and esteem him the tutelar patron of your city, instead 
of Jupiter and Apollo of Daphne." 88 "It concerns me extremely that 
all the gods are despised." 89 "Forbear to converse with the wives, 
children, and servants of the Galileans, who are impious towards the 
gods, and prefer impiety to religion." 90 

A crude drawing, caricaturing Christ, discovered in 
1857, but dating in the second or third century, serves to 

™ Cels. vlii, 14. 80J6. vii, 53. 

81 Porphyry's Letter to his wife, cited by Neander in Ch. Hist, i, 171. 

82 See Lard, vii, 438. &Ib. vii, 445. ** Neand. Ch. Hist, i, 171. 

»*Lard. vii, 478, 479. ™Ib. vii, 643. * Edict to People of Bostra, lb. vii, 651. 

MMispogon, lb. 647. &Epis. to Ecditius, lb. vii, 644. 

^Letter to Arsacius, high priest of Galatia, lb. vii, 645, 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 375 

illustrate the spirit of contempt for Jesus Christ in his death, 
and ridicule of the religious sentiments of the Christians 
which prevailed at that time about the imperial 

r ^ § 268. Graffiti 

palace. It was found in Kome, in the basement in 

of the Palace of the Ccesars, on the wall which is Cancature - 
now in ruins on the western slope of the Palatine Hill, and is 
preserved in the Kircheriano Museo, near the Yestal Virgins. 
The figure is that of a man clad in a toga, extended on a cross, 
having the head of a horse or ass, and a human figure before 
it in the attitude of homage. Underneath is a Greek inscrip- 
tion rudely scratched, reading 

"Alexamenos worships [his] God." 91 
It is certain that in the second century both Jews and 
Christians were ridiculed as being worshipers of the ass ; and 
it is a known fact that at this time there were Christians 
within the imperial palace. Tertullian refers to another cari- 
cature on the same subject. In his Apology to the Roman 
Senate he says : 

" Lately a new edition of our god has been given to the world in 
that great city [Eome]. It originated with a certain vile man [a Jew 
named Onocoites],* who was wont to hire himself out to cheat the wild 
beasts, and who exhibited a picture with this inscription: 

'The God of the Christians, born of an Ass.' 
He had the ears of an ass, was hoofed in one foot, carried a book, and 
wore a toga. Both the name and the figure gave us amusement. But 
our opponents ought straightway to have done homage to this bi- 
formed divinity ; for they have acknowledged gods dog-headed and lion- 
headed, with horn of buck and ram, with goatlike loins, with serpent 
legs, with wings sprouting from the back or foot! These things we 
have discussed out of the abundance, that we might not seem willingly 
to pass by any rumor against us unrefuted." 92 

Since the whole government was so decidedly opposed to 
Christianity, it is easy to understand that Christians were ex- 
posed to every method of persecution which caprice or malice 

* Or Onoccetes. 

91 'AXe|d/xevof <re^aT[ai\ debv. See Schaff's Hist. Christ. Church, ii, 272, note; 
and Bennett's Archceol. of Christian Art, pp. 94, 95. 

^Apology, c. 16; cornp. Ad Nationes, Lib. i, c. 14; ii, 11. 



376 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

might suggest. The pen of ridicule prepared society to make 
of the Christian religion a laughing-stock ; the pencil of cari. 
cature made their devotions a butt and byword of scorn in the 
community; and any form of assault upon their persons to 
cause pain and suffering was considered as done under the 
sanction of a virtual license. This was the natural sequence 
of the fact that the magistrates of the law gave away the 
lives of the Christians to the most horrible deaths on the 
clamors of an ignorant and superstitious rabble. 

The character and modes of Eoman punishment may be 

briefly indicated. It is not to be supposed that these methods 

were expressly invented to be inflicted upon the 

§ 269. The r J ■ r 

Roman Christians ; but as they were employed prior to 
unisnments. ^ e Christian era, there is no reason for believing 
that they were not expressly appropriated to that purpose. 
The descriptions given are taken from the writings of the 
most prominent and reliable of the Koman minds, and all 
were adverse to the Christian faith. 

a) Juvenal: " Do you expose Tegellinus [one of Nero's court], and 
you will blaze in that torch where, with throats transfixed to a stake 
and emitting froth, they stand and burn, and you draw a furrow in the 
midst of the sand." 93 

]8) Martial: " You have perhaps seen recently acted in the theater, 
Mucius, him who thrusts his hand into the fire. If you think such an 
one patient, valiant, stout, you are a senseless dotard. For it is a much 
greater thing, when threatened with the troublesome coat, to say ' I do 
not sacrifice [to thy gods]' than to obey the command, 'Burn the 
hand.' " 94 

7) Seneca: "Imagine here a prison, crosses, and racks, and the 
hook ; and a stake thrust through the body and coming out at the mouth ; 
and limbs torn by chariots pulling adverse ways ; and the coat be- 
smeared and interwoven with materials nutriment for fire ; and, besides 
these, whatever else cruelty has invented. It is no wonder if, in such- 
case, fear rises high where the variety of evils is so great, and the prep- 
aration is so terrible." 95 
§ 270. III. The Voice of Modern Historians. 

1. Edward Gibbon: "The primitive Christian demonstrated his 
faith by his virtues ; and it was justly supposed that the divine persua- 

MSatura {Satira), i, 155-157. ^Lib. x, Epigr. 35. 

»5 Seneca's Letter, xiv, cited in Lard, vi, 637. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 377 

sion which enlightened or subdued the understanding, must at the same 
time purify the heart and direct the actions of the believer. The first 
apologists of Christianity who justify the innocence of their brethren, 
and the writers of a later period who celebrate the sanctity of their an- 
cestors, display in the most lively colors the reformation of manners 
which was introduced into the world by the preaching of the gospel. 
. . . It is a very ancient reproach, suggested by the ignorance and 
malice of infidelity, that the Christians allured into their party the most 
atrocious criminals, who, as soon as they were touched by a sense of re- 
morse, were easily persuaded to wash away in the water of baptism the 
guilt of their past conduct, for which the temples of the gods refused to 
grant them any expiation." " Those who survey with a curious eye the 
revolutions of mankind, may observe that the gardens and circus of 
Nero on the Vatican, which were polluted with the blood of the first 
Christians, have been rendered still more famous by the triumph and 
by the abuse of the persecuted religion. On the same spot a temple, which 
far surpasses the ancient glories of the Capitol, has been since erected 
by the Christian pontiffs, who, deriving their claim of universal do- 
minion from an humble fisherman of Galilee, have succeeded to the 
throne of the Caesars, given laws to the barbarian conquerors of Eome, 
and extended their spiritual jurisdiction from the coasts of the Baltic to 
the shores of the Pacific Ocean." 96 

2. Dr. Thomas Arnold : Referring to the Church of San 
Stef ano at Rome, this writer remarks : 

" It is likely enough, too, that Gibbon has truly accused the general 
statements [given by monks] of exaggeration. But this is a thankless 
labor. Divide the sum total of the reported martyrs by twenty, by 
fifty if you will ; after all, you have a number of persons of all ages and 
sexes suffering cruel torments and death for conscience' sake and for 
Christ's ; and by their sufferings, manifestly with God's blessing, in- 
suring the triumph of Christ's Gospel. Neither do I think that we 
consider the excellence of this martyr spirit half enough. ... As 
God's grace enabled rich and delicate persons, women and even chil- 
dren, to endure all extremes of pain and reproach in times past, so 
there is the same grace no less mighty now ; and if we do not close 
ourselves against it, it might be in us no less glorious in the time of 
trial." 97 

3. William E. H. Lecky, himself a rationalist, criticises 
severely Gibbon's cold-blooded account of the early persecu- 
tions of the Christians. He says : 

" The complete absence of all sympathy with the heroic courage 
manifested by the martyrs, and the frigid and in truth most unphilo- 

*> Decline and Fall, etc., i, xvi, pp. 543, 602, Amer. ed. 
« Cited by Schaff, Hist, of Christ. Ch. ii, 81. 



378 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



sophical severity with which the historian [Gibbon] has weighed the 
words and actions of men engaged in the agonies of a deadly struggle, 
must repel every generous nature ; while the persistence with which he 
estimates persecutions by the number of deaths, rather than the amount 
of suffering, diverts the mind from the really distinctive atrocities of 
the pagan persecutions." " There was a time when it was the just boast 
of the Romans, that no refinement of cruelty, no prolongation of tor- 
ture, were admitted in their stern but simple penal code. But all this 
was changed. Those hateful games which made the spectacle of human 
suffering and death the delight of all classes, had spread their brutaliz- 
ing influence wherever the Roman name was known ; had rendered 
millions absolutely indifferent to the sight of human suffering; had 
produced in many, in the very center of an advanced civilization, a 
relish and a passion for torture, a rapture and an exultation in watching 
the spasms of extreme agony, such as an African or an American savage 
alone can equal." ... " For the love of their Divine Master, for the 
cause they believed to be true, men and even weak girls, endured 
those things without flinching, when one word would have freed them 
from their sufferings. No opinions we may form of the proceedings of 
priests in a later age, should impair the reverence with which we 
bend before the martyr's tomb." 98 

4. Dr. Philip Schaff: "It was not so much the amount of suffering 
which challenges our attention — although it was terrible enough — as 
the spirit with which the early Christians bore it. Men and women of 
all classes, noble senators and learned bishops, . . . hoary-headed 
pastors and innocent children, approached their tortures in no temper of 
unfeeling indifference and obstinate defiance, but, like their Divine 
Master, with calm self-possession, humble resignation, gentle meekness, 
triumphant hope, and forgiving charity. 

" Only two imperial persecutions — those of Decius and Diocletian — 
extended over the empire. But Christianity was always an illegal re- 
ligion from Trajan to Constantine, and subject to annoyance and violence 
everywhere." " The long and bloody war of heathen Rome against 
the Church . . . utterly failed. It began in Rome under Nero, and 
it ended near Rome at the Milvian bridge under Constantine." 99 

5. McClintock and Strong: "The very earliest sufferings of the 
Church of Christ and its Head are the subjects of New Testament his- 
tory. . . . The last persecution of the Christians began in the 
nineteenth year of the Emperor Diocletian, A. D. 303. The most 
violent promoters of it were Hierocles the philosopher, who wrote 
against the Christian religion, and Galerius, whom Diocletian had 
declared Csesar. . . . The human imagination was indeed almost 
exhausted in inventing a variety of tortures." 10 ° 

wfflsL European Morals, i, 494, etseq. ^Hist. Christ. Church, ii, 75, 76,34. 

ioo Cyclop, vii, 965, 966. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 379 



A GENERAL SURVEY OF THE SITUATION. 

A circumstance injurious to the success of Christianity was 

the self-exposure to persecutions imposed upon all who embraced 

and adhered to that religion. In view of the 

. -, n , § 271. char- 
natural heart, this was necessitated by the acter of the 

aggressive character of the Gospel itself , for by Gos P el - 
nature it was more than exclusive of all other religions ; it 
was uncompromising in its demands respecting them. In its 
inherent spirituality and purpose, it was thoroughly antago- 
nistic toward all heathen and traditional beliefs of men. It 
recognized no friends among the nations; it permitted no 
protection from any earthly power ; it allowed no treaty of 
peace with the disbeliever. Though it employed the gentlest 
methods of persuasion, it exacted an unqualified submission to 
its own behests. It could do no less, since it involved a move- 
ment of men's conscience in the direction of truth as an appeal 
for the salvation of mankind. 

The Gospel was to be enforced by its own exactions. The 
Christian apostle met the philosopher pursuing his studies at 
the porch of the Academy, saying: "The world by wisdom 
knew not God." " Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of 
this world? God hath chosen the foolish things of this world 
to confound the wise ; . . . for it hath pleased God by the 
foolishness of preaching to save them that believe." He met 
the heathen priests beneath the shadow of their own temple, 
attired in their most gorgeous apparel, engaged in their sacer- 
dotal rites at the altars, and told them : " Your pretense of 
religion is a degrading superstition and a cheat ! " He entered 
the synagogue of the Jew, and said : " Your ceremonies have 
outlived their usefulness; your system has become a mere 
worthless shell ; and your last chance of eternal life is to de- 
vote your whole heart and life in service to the Man of 
Nazareth, whom you have despised and crucified ! " He told 



380 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

the average unbeliever: *'You are a depraved sinner: you 
must repent of your sins and reform your life, or you will be 
damned." 

Whatever beliefs, wherever found, whatever institutions of 
ancient origin, whatever laws, however wise, whatever 
customs however venerated, which had come down from 
antiquity with the sanction and sanctity of an ancestral relig- 
ion, were required to submit without qualification to the 
supremacy of the new religion of Jesus Christ. There was 
no place left for the pomp and display coveted by the 
natural man. Temples built of rarest marbles, flashing in all 
the lights of the skies; priests robed in brilliant costumes, 
ministering in ceremonies on festive occasions ; public games 
religiously observed in honor of Jupiter, the supreme god, who 
was supposed to preside; the imposing processions organized 
for the entertainment of the populace, — these were the very 
things to be relinquished and replaced by a religion of humil- 
ity without display; a religion which was without a temple, 
without an altar, without a priest, without a sacrifice, and 
without the statue of a god. 

Such exactions and such antagonisms, of course, enraged 
the people. Senators, magistrates, magnates, and rulers; men 
of distinction, of position, and power in society 
fects on the and in the State, naturally scorned the upstart 
a ura an. re ]jgj on Q f fae Nazarene, which would under- 
take in one stroke to remove both the histories and the mys- 
teries of their own ancient and ancestral worship, substituting 
a life of self-denial and self-humiliation. Kings who had ruled 
their realms in peace ; emperors who were high priests of the 
religion of the empire; conquerors who had received tri- 
umphals at the Eoman Capital, became alarmed and were 
aroused to determined resistance and hostility to the new and 
pernicious superstition. For all understood perfectly that 
Christianity proposed to displace the gods adopted by the 
empire, and in place enthrone One whom they designated 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 381 

" a dead Jew." Could any proposition have carried with it 
more to disgust and excite the antagonism of the lordly and 
powerful Koman? But they were filled with astonishment 
and dismay when they learned that the people were flocking 
by multitudes from the old altars to embrace the new religion; 
that their ancestral faith, which had been incorporated into 
the very structure of society and the government, and had 
applied to all the civic functions of the State, and ruled in all 
the military expeditions of the empire, must hereafter be dis- 
avowed and destroyed, for the establishment of another king- 
dom which shall know no end. Naturally enough, as a matter 
of reprisal and for the suppression of the new faith, laws were 
legislated making Christianity unlawful, and imperial edicts 
were issued for the extinction of the Christian religion by the 
extermination of its subjects, declaring its acceptance hence- 
forth an act of high treason ! 

From such ground it is easy to see what would naturally 
follow. Persecutions fierce and cruel arose, the like of which 
the world has never seen. How could Christianity be main- 
tained, much less voluntary accessions be made to its numbers, 
with the opposition of the powerful government of earth and 
hell ? Everything was now at stake. It darkens the soul to 
contemplate the atrocities perpetrated upon a people whose 
whole offense was the crime of being good. On the human 
side, the most astounding wonder is that the world should ever 
have believed on Christ ; for his followers knew that they must 
be willing to lay down their lives for his sake and the gos- 
pel's; for the Savior had said that he that loved father or 
mother, son or daughter, more than Christ, was not worthy of 
him. Nevertheless, to be driven from one's home, to go 
unloved by the nearest kindred ; to draw down upon one's self 
the open hostility of those dearest to us on earth, with the 
passionate revenges of rulers who were clothed with an irre- 
sponsible power, is a fearful test of human fidelity. But the 
Christians chose to escape to the wilds and wastes of the des- 



382 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ert; to be exiled from the dearest friends of affection, and 
betake themselves to the solitudes of the wilderness; to hold 
fellowship with the wild beasts in the dens and caves of the 
mountains; to take refuge in the catacombs underneath the 
city of Home, and receive communion in remembrance of 
Christ in its rocky chapel; or die and be buried by fellow- 
refugees in the niches of those dark and silent galleries of 
stone underground, satisfied in death to have the simplest sym- 
bol or expression of their faith carved over the place of sep- 
ulture, rather than make the surrender implied in worshiping 
fictitious gods, or revile the Savior's name. Their happiness 
of spirit brought charms to the solitudes of their dwelling- 
place. Immured in dungeons, they join in midnight praise- 
meetings, and Divine power bowed the prison walls, shook the 
earth, and freed the prisoners from their stocks. 

What is the meaning of this sublime endurance for the 

sake of Jesus? It certainly was not because the primitive 

Christians possessed a sullen perverseness of 

tion in spirit, that in the exactions of the Eoman Gov- 
ernment they so nobly braved such nameless 
wrongs without repining, choosing to suffer all kinds of insults 
and injuries rather than recant their faith and blaspheme the 
Christ of their love, or burn incense before the statue of Cgesar 
and his false gods. Their only return is made in the sweet- 
ness of a forgiving spirit : 

" Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto 
wrath. ... Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good." 
" But let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evil- 
doer, or as a busybody in other men's matters ; yet if any man suffer as 
a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God on this 
behalf." 

" Whence but from heaven could men unskilled in arts, 
In several ages born, in several parts, 
Weave such agreeing truths ? or how, or why, 
Should all conspire to cheat us with a lie ? 
Unasked their pains, ungrateful their advice, 
Starving their gain, and martyrdom their price." — Dryden. 



The Persecutions of the Primitive Christians. 383 



INDUCTIONS. 

The facts established by the foregoing evidence warrant 
the following inductions : 

1. That the real position, spirit, and character of the primitive 

Christians were misunderstood both by the Jews and 
Romans. 

2. That the Christians merely maintained their inalienable 

rights of conscience and just judgment touching their 
own worship. 

3. That the imposition of tortures and death on Christ's 

followers was a departure from the ancient Eoman laws 
and justice. 

4. That the severity of the Christians' sufferings was such as 

even excited the sympathy of the heathen spectators and 
public. 

5. That the offense the most offensive to the Romans was the 

rejection of their deities, and the exaltation of Jesus 
Christ as God. 

6. That the kingdom of Jesus Christ on earth, being spiritual 

and imperishable, can not be destroyed by any power 
possessed by man. 

7. That the doctrine and faith of the primitive Christians re- 

specting Jesus Christ were identical with those of Christen- 
dom to-day. 



25 



CHAPTEE XIV. 

UNIQUE CONDITION OF PALESTINE FOE THE 
FIKST FIFTY YEAKS. 

I. The Unique Condition of Society and the Country. 
II. Two Civilizations side by side in one Community. 

III. Sudden Changes op Eulers under Imperial Government. 

IV. Evidential Value op Minor Circumstances in History. 



Chapter XIV. 

UNIQUE CONDITION OF PALESTINE FOE 
FIFTY YEAES. 

§ 274. Sources : Biographical Epitomes of Witnesses and Literature. 

1. Flavius Josephus (born A. D. 37, died about 103), whose birth 
occurred in the eighth year after the ascension of Christ, accord- 
ing to the Christian Calendar, was born in the first year of the 
reign of Caligula, the Roman Emperor. He was accordingly the 
contemporary of the Apostle John, and died about the same time. 
Josephus was a priest of the Jews, a Pharisee in sect, the 
governor of Galilee, a general in the Roman- Jewish war, and an 
historian in literature. He became commander of the Jewish 
forces at the famous fortress named Jutapata, to resist the Roman 
invasion begun by Vespasian. After a siege of seven weeks, and 
suffering great distress, he was compelled to surrender ; an offense 
to the Jews which they have never forgiven him. A prisoner of 
war, he was kindly treated, and had unusual privileges accorded 
him at the Roman headquarters. From thence he became a per- 
sonal witness of all the military details and events which occurred 
later, in the investment of Jerusalem under Titus. He has fur- 
nished the very best historical account extant of the reduction of 
the Holy City to a ruin, the burning of the Jewish temple, the 
complete destruction of the Jewish nation, the expatriation of 
" the peculiar people," and the subjection of his surviving coun- 
trymen to untold humiliation and distresses, exactly accordant 
with the sorrowful prediction of Jesus Christ concerning that gen- 
eration. These events occurred in A. D. 70, and Josephus wrote 
his history of this war about the year 75. According to the 
opinion of Dr. Schaff , this work was completed prior to his writing 
the Antiquities of the Jews, which was not long before his death. 
As indicating the character of the Wars, Josephus claims to have 
had the indorsement of Vespasian and Titus, the two who con- 
ducted the invasion, and afterwards became emperors. He also 
states that Titus affixed his signature to verify the accuracy of his 
history of the war, and that he ordered it to be published ; and 
that King Herod Agrippa II, who also had a command against the 
Jews, added his personal approval in verification, as may be seen 

387 



388 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



in two letters which appear in the Life of Josephus prefixed to his 
works, § 65. For a discussion pro and con respecting the genuine- 
ness of the celebrated testimony concerning Jesus Christ, see 
Appendix A, and Wars I, c. 1, §9. 

2. Suetonius (wrote about 110 A. D.) was the celebrated biographer of 

the " Twelve Csesars " who ruled the Roman Empire. He was the 
secretary of Hadrian through the friendly offices of Pliny, junior. 
That circumstance gives an added value to these biographies, for 
the reason that he sustained such confidential relations with the 
emperor as secured for him access to the governmental archives. 
In two of his biographies he refers to Christ, though briefly, and 
to the Christians thrice. 

3. Celsus (wrote A. D. 150-175) was a Greek Eclectic philosopher, al- 

though mentioned by Origen as an Epicurean. Nothing is known 
of his personal life or his ancestors. He was, however, the literary 
champion and the first writer who endeavored to extinguish 
Christianity with his pen, employing all the force of learning, wit, 
and ridicule against the Christian faith. His work was entitled 
A6yo? 'AKydri?, A True Discourse. He first represents himself ficti- 
tiously as a Jew believing in the supernatural — a belief, however, 
which he actually rejected ; and then he endeavored to test the 
Christian religion by the principles of his philosophy. Withal, he 
is said to have mingled much with the Jews to learn all he could 
against Christianity, making capital from their unctuous hate 
toward the Christians. His work was published about one hun- 
dred years after the publication of the four Gospels, which he 
often cites. The Encycl. Britannica, under his name, observes : 
" He takes note of almost every objection which has been brought 
against Christianity, and his position is substantially that which 
is assumed by the scientific opponents of Christianity in the pres- 
ent day." Dr. Schaff remarks: "Lardner, Doddridge, and Leland 
made good use of Celsus against the Deists of their day. He may 
with still greater effect be turned against Strauss and Renan " in our 
day. 

We know Celsus's work only through the reply of Origen in 
refutation, which is entitled Origen contra Celsum. Origen re- 
marks : " We are careful to guard against being supposed to pass 
over any of the charges advanced by him." (Bk. ii, c. 46 ; viii, 76.) 
From these comprehensive extracts made by Origen, the original 
work of Celsus has been reconstructed by several distinguished 
critics, more recently by Dr. Keim, of Zurich (1878). 

Celsus had a remarkable knowledge of the contents of the 
New Testament, mentioning nearly every event in our Lord's life 
with great exactness. Unquestionably he was the possessor of a 
copy of those Scriptures, the authorship of which he again and 
again ascribes to Christ's disciples. Unfortunately his work is 



Unique Condition of Palestine fob Fifty Yeaes. 389 

marred by a malignant spirit, delighting in ridiculing what is 
sacred to reverent minds ; that which he least understood. It 
was in bad taste that he employed opprobrious and scandalous 
language in regard to the origin of Jesus and his mother. 

4. Livy (Titus Livius) was born in North Italy B. C. 50, and resided 

mostly in Rome. He enjoyed an intimacy with Claudius when 
young, and also the favor of the Emperor Augustus. He acquired 
great fame by his Annals, written in Latin, containing a history of 
Rome from its foundation until the death of Drusus, B. C. 9. Of 
the original 142 books, only 35 are now extant. It is divided into 
Decades, magnifying the Roman greatness, and is written in a 
pleasing narrative, unlike any other ancient history in style. 

5. Plutarch, a native Greek, studied philosophy in A. D. 66, when Nero 

made his notorious visit to Greece ; became a Lecturer on Philos- 
ophy in Rome during the reign of Domitian (A. D, 81-96), and 
died in the reign of Hadrian (117-138). His literary work by 
which he acquired a great reputation bore the title Parallel Lives. 
It is unique in character, consisting of forty-six biographies of 
notable men divided into pairs. It is written in a flowing style, 
and is very interesting and instructive. 

6. Alford, Henry (1810-1871), was a distinguished scholar, theologian, 

and poet. A native of London, a Fellow of Trinity College, Cam- 
bridge, in 1834, he became Dean of Canterbury in 1856. He was a 
Biblical critic of the first class. He was the author of a Greek 
Testament, Critically Revised Text; a Commentary (4 vols. 1872, 
6th ed.) 

§ 275. Unique Condition of Palestine During the First Fifty Years of the 
Christian Era. 

Inquire, I pray thee, of the former age, and apply thyself to that which 
their fathers have searched out. . . . Shall not they teach thee 
and tell thee ? — Job. 

Let all the nations be gathered together. . . . Who among them 
can declare this, and show us former things ? Let them bring 
their witnesses, that they may be justified ; or let them hear and 
say, It is truth. — Isaiah. 

The points where the documents of the New Testament touch upon his- 
tory proper are not direct, but indirect, and the allusions are 
and must be incidental. But for this very reason they are ex- 
tremely important as respects their evidential value. ... To 
maintain accuracy in a wide field of incidental allusion is a 
matter of the utmost difficulty ; and no one but an honest, truth- 
ful writer would venture on such a perilous experiment at all. [It 
would be] utterly at variance with the mythical spirit which the 
narrative of the New Testament is sometimes affirmed to be 
the product. . . . [As such] its composers would have no ob- 
ject to maintain accuracy at all. — Maclear. 



390 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



ARGUMENT. 
During the first half-century of the Christian era occurred the most 
extraordinary changes and apparent complications in the political 
condition of the land unparalleled in history. This anomalous 
condition of society was due to sudden alterations and reversions 
in the local governments, occasioned by the deposing or death of 
the rulers severally, and the appointment of new and different 
functions, together with the twofold ruling of the Jews by the 
Romans and the Sanhedrin. The historical situation was rendered 
exceedingly difficult of description by any one, not a native, living 
in the apostolic times. Two different civilizations existing side 
by side in one community, having but little in common, but 
much in diversity in respect to religion, language, laws, and polit- 
ical institutions, rendered the situation complex. A study of the 
historical part of the New Testament demonstrates a marvelous 
insight on the part of the writers into the spirit and occurrences 
of the times, and also attests the antiquity and authenticity of 
the Gospels themselves. 

1. The unique Condition of the Country during the First 

Fifty Years of the Christian Era. 

2. Two Civilizations side by side in one Community and 

the Diversities peculiar to each. 

3. Sudden Changes in Administration over the Jews, 

under the Imperial Government of Rome. 

4. The Evidential Value of many Minor Circumstances 

touching the Truth of Sacred History. 

I. Unique Condition of Society for Fifty Years. 

A scientific inquiry conducted along the line of the internal 

evidence of the New Testament in its historical narratives 

_ which are to have confirmation from various ex- 

§ 276. The 

case ternal sources, must take account of the polit- 
ical condition of Palestine as organized during 
that particular period. Comparisons instituted between the 
contents of the Book and the current facts of the times as 
ascertained from secular writers, with a view to the authen- 
ticity of these Scriptures, is that which is in request in such 
investigation. Any correspondences or discrepancies should 
be noted as between the sacred and secular writers, no matter 
how brief or incidental the mention; whether relating to 
persons, places, or periods ; whether referring to pivotal occur- 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 391 

rences in history, or to minute circumstances of seemingly 
inconsiderable importance. For such particulars furnish the 
very evidence to be sought. 

A multitude of subtle indications evidence that the sacred 
writers were either personal witnesses of facts which they de- 
scribe in their narratives, or received their information directly 
from those who were eye-witnesses. The principal occur- 
rences of the times are mentioned, the names of the political 
rulers are given, sudden and surprising events are narrated 
involving governmental changes in respect to both a part 
and the whole of the Palestinian country, all referred to in 
the most incidental manner, in terms of the briefest expression, 
and then left unexplained, as if perfectly understood by the 
writers themselves and their contemporaries addressed. 

The political situation of Palestine is to be investigated in 
reference to that period in which Jesus Christ and his apostles 
lived and labored for the establishment of the 

§277. Condition 

Christian religion. Within the limits of about of the 

a half -century, beginning with the incarnation 
of our Lord and extending to the coronation of Herod 
Agrippa II, great-grandson of Herod the Great — from the 
first to the last of the house of the Herods — there existed a 
condition of public affairs probably never known for the same 
period in the history of the world. In the year 63 or 64 B. C, 
Pompey the Great made a complete conquest of the Jews, and 
captured Jerusalem. At the opening of the Christian era, the 
nation had been for a long time enduring the reign of the first 
Herod ; for it had been specifically stipulated that their king 
should be from their own land, and they should live under 
their own laws, and maintain their own religion. But Herod 
the Great and his successors were the merest dependents upon 
the imperial will at Eome. It thence came to pass, in the 
distribution of authority over the Jewish nation, that its civil 
affairs were administered mostly by Komans, who were su- 
preme and enforced their will by an army of occupation, while 



392 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

the Jews governed themselves by a hierarchy known as the 
Sanhedrin, which was their supreme judicial council. Each 
had its own appointed place and power. The high priest had 
usually been chosen as president of the Council because of his 
eminence in wisdom and worth ; but at length the high priest- 
hood became a political appointment and was often changed 
by Herod Agrippa II. Previously, and at surprisingly short 
intervals of time, changes came touching both the government 
and the people, out of which arose new political divisions and 
combinations of territory, the assignment of new rulers of an 
entirely different character, by the order of the emperor at 
the Capital. These changes were precipitated sometimes by 
the deposing of a ruler, and sometimes by his death; but in 
either case the occasion was followed by a transfer or a rever- 
sion of the territory to the condition of a province, and some- 
times by the transfer of a king from an inferior principality 
to a kingdom, each instance requiring a reorganization of the 
governmental administration. 

The result was that matters of political geography among 
the Jews in Palestine, which seem to have been perfectly sim- 
§278. Mistakes pl e to the writers of that age, were intricate 
of writers. anc [ difficult of understanding, if not absolutely 
complicated, to a writer of a century or two later. Hence 
Celsus, the apostle of literary opposition to the Christians, 
about a century after the publication of the Gospels, made 
egregious mistakes in tracing the history of the apostolic 
times ; a notable instance of which occurs in his confounding 
Herod Antipas, the Tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea, with his 
father, Herod the Great, the first Herodian king of Palestine. 
He says: 

' ' The Chaldeans are spoken of by Jesus as having been induced to 
come to him at his birth and worship him while he was yet an infant as 
a God ; and to have made this known to Herod the tetrarch ; and that 
the latter sent and slew all the infants that were born about the same 
time," 1 etc. 



Origen contra Celsum, i, 58. 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 393 

In like manner it is claimed that the Roman historian Dion 
Cassius's "notices are confused. He scarcely seems able to 
distinguish between one Herod and another." 2 Yet these 
writers lived not far remote from the events which they 
attempt to describe. Such instances of mistake relating to 
matters of that period witness to the extreme difficulty and 
dangers to which later writers would be exposed who should 
falsely attempt to represent themselves as living in the Apos- 
tolic Age when describing the stirring and surprising events 
occurring around them. So with the four Evangelists writing 
the Gospels. They must have written in the times ascribed 
to them, to have written so accurately. One might have 
acquired the reputation of being a literary adventurer, but he 
would have scant hope of escaping the charge of being an 
impostor or a fool in presuming to foist upon mankind unhis- 
torical documents as being Gospels of truth purporting to have 
been written in that remarkable country, in those remarkable 
times. For as remarked by Mr. George Eawlinson : 

"It is important to bear in mind in this connection the fact that 
there is no period in the whole range of ancient history whereof we 
possess a more full and exact knowledge than we do of the first of our 
[Christian] era." 3 

Now, the Evangelists illustrate the times in which they 
lived by describing in the Gospels the current history of the 
period with such remarkable exactness. Sometimes they de- 
tail main facts with fullness and force; and sometimes, also, 
they pass important as well as incidental circumstances with 
briefest mention, as being perfectly understood without re- 
quiring further remark. But in all cases, they obviously speak 
out from amidst the current events of the Apostolic Age in 
which they were living, without reserve, and without explana- 
tion ; and, as a consequence, so far from being contradicted by 
any of their contemporaries, they are often absolutely con- 

2 Hist, of Rome, xliv, liii, lv, lx, cited by Mr. George Rawlinson, Bampton 
Lects., Amer. ed., note 21, end. 
s Jb. p. 383, n. 3, end. 



394 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

firmed by those unfriendly to their faith, who lived in or near 
their own times. And, withal, the Evangelists mention public 
occurrences without any strain or effort, without exaggeration 
or glorification, but rather with that simplicity and candor of 
spirit which have carried conviction of truth to millions of 
minds in all succeeding ages. 

II. Two Civilizations Side by Side in one Community. 

In the distribution of legal authority over the Jewish 
nation there were two jurisdictions. The Jewish Sanhedrin 
§279. Twofold was composed of the high priest, the elders and 
Authority. SC ribes; 4 but superior in power was the office of 
the Eoman procurator, who seems at this time to have the 
exclusive right over life and death. We do not know at what 
time the Jews lost their ancient power in this respect; but 
Josephus mentions " Coponius, . . . who was sent as pro- 
curator, having the power of death put in his hands by 
Caesar." 5 Accordingly, Pilate said to Jesus : " Knowest thou 
not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to re- 
lease thee ?" 6 " The Jews therefore said unto him : It is not 
lawful for us to put any man to death." 7 The Sanhedrin 
could condemn Jesus as "guilty [deserving] of death," but 
were powerless to execute their own verdict. To secure an 
execution, they were compelled to deliver Jesus to Pilate, the 
Roman procurator. 8 This they did. However, the indictment 
must not refer merely to matters of their religion ; it must, in 
order to be entertained at all, contain an averment of a polit- 
ical character. So the wily conspirators against Christ in- 
serted a charge of treason against him : " We found this fellow 
perverting the nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar, 
saying that he himself is king." 9 

When a foreign nation dominates another and occupies its 
territory, it naturally imports its own manners and procedures, 

*Mark xiv, 53. 6 Jewish War, B. ii, chapt. 8, § 1. « John xix. 

Ub. xviii, 81. » John xviii, 35. 9 Luke xxiii, 1, 2; cf. Matt, xxii, 15-21. 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 395 

and the mixed population then exhibits customs incongruous, 
if not conflicting. So, during the ministry of Christ, and 
afterward, Palestine had its peculiar character- _ , 

' r § 280. Laws 

istics. Ever after Pompey's conquest the Jew- and 
ish nation and country were held as a depend- us oms ' 
ency upon the Roman Empire ; and an army of the Romans 
was in occupation, ready always to enforce the requirements 
of the rulers, and subdue the tumultuous spirit of the Jews. 
By express stipulation, however, the Jews were from the first 
free to enjoy all the rights of their religion and the exercise 
of their own laws, except the power to impose and execute 
death. Touching the situation Ananias, the high-priest, makes 
this guarded concession: "If indeed it be necessary to adjust 
names to deeds, any one might easily find that the Romans 
have indeed been those who were the confirmers of our laws 
unto us, and that the enemies have been those within [the 
nation]." 10 In the final rebellion of the Jews, while Titus 
was conducting the siege of Jerusalem, which eventuated in 
the utter destruction of the city and nation, he appealed to 
the Jews to discontinue their resistance as fanatical. He said, 
according to Josephus : 

" In the first place, we gave you this land to possess it ; and, in the 
next place, have set over you kings of your own nation [viz., the Her- 
ods] ; and, in the third place, have preserved the laws of your fore- 
fathers unto you, and withal permitted you to live either by yourselves 
or among others as you please." u 

The historical argument as to the fact that the Jews and 
Romans at this period were existing side by side in very pe- 
culiar relations, as is constantly brought to view in the Gospels, 
may be further illustrated by many instances incidentally 
mentioned therein. Two bodies of armed men exercised author- 
ity at Jerusalem ; the one was known as the Levitical temple 
guard called "a band," 12 led by "a captain," 13 but armed 

10 Wars, iv, 3, 10. " Wars, vi, 6, 2. 

12 27rerpa, a cohort; "a band, John, xviii, 12. is ^Tparrjydg- Luke xxll, 4, S2. 



396 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

" with staves and weapons ;" u the same party who arrested 
Jesus and bound him at the garden of G-ethsemane ; the other, 
the Roman soldiers who were an army of occupation, whose 
headquarters were at Caesarea, one cohort consisting of four 
hundred and twenty to six hundred soldiers being stationed 
at the fort built at Jerusalem named Antonia, located at the 
northwest of the temple grounds. Here they were charged 
with the duty of guarding the public peace, especially on the 
great feast-days of the Jews. It was the duty of a small 
detachment to conduct to its completion the sentence of cruci- 
fixion, and to guard against the interference of friends to take 
the body away without express permission from the procura- 
tor. 15 There were two modes of inflicting capital punishment. 
The old law of Jewish independence, consisting either of ston- 
ing, according to the original law of Moses, which was illegally 
exercised in the case of Stephen, or of strangling, according to 
the rabbinical law inserted in the Talmud, in which " strangu- 
lation was the mode of execution for a learned man who 
rebelled against their words;" 16 while the Romans, after 
due process, were addicted to first scourge the condemned 
criminal, and then crucify him. 17 In case of crucifixion, the 
Jews sought to mitigate or shorten the sufferings by what was 
called crucifragium, known in the Gospels as the breaking 
of the legs of the sufferer. 

Both Livy (Titus Livius) and Josephus, who 
' ment^of 1 " wrote their histories in the Apostolic Period, 
criminals. ^ us k ear witness to the Roman custom of pun- 
ishment. 

a) Scourgings. Livy affirms that, " after they had been 
scourged they fastened them to crosses." 18 Josephus says : 

"They caught many of the quiet people and brought them before 
Florus [the Roman procurator], whom he first chastised with stripes, 

"Matt, xxvi, 47; Mark xiv, 43; Luke xxii, 52; John xvlii, 8, 12, Rev. Vers. 
16 Matt xxvii, 54; John xix, 23, 24, 38; Luke xxiii, 47, 51, 52; Mark xv, 43-45. 
"Deut. xiil, 9; xvil, 7; Ex. xvli,4; Luke xx, 6; John x,31; vili, 7; Acts vll, 58; 
Talmud, Sanhedrin, vi, 1, 4; Hilcholh, Mamrim, c. 1, 2. 

"Matt, xxvii, 26; Mark xv, 15; John xix, 1. i«Livy,x,9; he died 17 A. D. 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 397 

and then crucified. . . . Florus adventured to do what no other 
[procurator] had done before him, to have men of the equestrian order 
whipped and nailed to the cross before the tribunal." "So they first 
whipped [them] . . . before they died, and [they] were then crucified 
before the walls of the city. ... So the soldiers, out of wrath and 
hatred they bore the Jews, nailed those they caught, one after one way 
and another after another, to the crosses . . . when the multitude 
was so great that room was wanting for the crosses, and crosses were 
wanting for the bodies." 19 

/?) Cross-hearings. The Eomans executed their laws with 
rigor in cases of capital punishment, and their custom was to 
compel the condemned man to bear his cross to the place of 
crucifixion. The Gospel records an illustration of this re- 
quirement in the case of Jesus : "And he bearing his own cross, 
went forth unto a place called the place of a skull, . . . where 
they crucified him." 20 Plutarch wrote: "Every kind of 
wickedness produces its own torment, [just as] each one of the 
criminals bears forth his own cross." 21 Artemidorus of Ephesus 
said : " The cross is the symbol of death ; and he that is about 
to be nailed to it, first carries it along." 22 

y) Superscription. A superscription placed by the Ro- 
mans on the tablet at the head of the cross was intended to 
be declarative of the supposed crime in any given case. The 
Gospels mention this custom in referring to the crucifixion 
of Jesus. John says : " Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on 
the cross," 23 and Matthew adds, "and set up over his head 
this accusation." 24 His designation of the superscription as an 
"accusation" is significant, not as implying that the charge 
was true, but that it was merely an "accusation" and impliedly 
false.* It was a tri- written superscription in the principal 
languages of the world at that time ; in the Hebrew, the ver- 
nacular of the Jews ; in the Greek, the commercial language 
between nations ; and in Latin, the court language of the Ro- 

* Rawlinson's Bamplon Lectures, 1859, Amer. ed., p. 401, note. 
19 Wars, li, 14, 9; v. 11, 1. *> John xix, 16-19. 

2 i 'EKacrTOf tQv KOLKoiipyajv iwpipei rbv avrov cravpbv. 

^OpeipoKpLTiKd (Interpretation of Dreams) ii, 61. Artemidorus (Daldianus) was 
a philosopher of Ephesus. 

M John xix, 19, 20. M Matt, xxvii, 37, atria, accusation. 



898 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

man Empire. The purpose of this tri- written superscription 
was to inform all men what the charge against Christ was. 25 

That this use of the tablet mid its title is historical, will be 
rendered sufficiently obvious by a few instances : 

Hesychius, a bishop of Egypt, thus describes the tablet: "A board, 
a door, a plastered tablet, on which in Athens accusations against 
criminals were written." Suetonius, of Rome, mentions a man who 
" dragged from the theater the father of a family, . . . and cast him 
to the dogs in the arena, with the title, 'A Parmularian guilty of talking 
impiously.' " Also, "At Rome in a public feast, a slave having stolen 
some thin plates of silver with which the couches were inlaid, he 
[Caligula] delivered him immediately to an executioner, with orders to 
cut off his hands, and lead him around the guests, with them hanging 
from his breast, and a label signifying the cause of his punishment." 26 
Dion Cassius mentions a perfidious slave who was led " through the 
midst of the market place with a writing declaring the cause of his death, 
and afterwards they crucified him." 21 

8) Body-Guard. It was another custom of the Romans, in 
inflicting the death penalty, to place a soldier to stand guard 
over the body, lest some friend of the criminal should ad- 
venture to take it away for burial. In any case express per- 
mission must have been asked and given by the chief ruler 
before the body could be delivered to any one for sepulture. 
This again is exactly accordant with the statements of the 
four Gospels respecting the dead body of Jesus. They narrate 
that Joseph of Arimathea " went to Pilate and asked for the 
dead body of Jesus. Then Pilate commanded it to be given 
up. And Joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean 
cloth, and laid it in his own new tomb which he had hewn out 
of a rock." 28 In harmony with this usage is the testimony of 
the Emperor Diocletian (284-303) and Maximian (286-203), 
who said : 

" We do not forbid that those who are guilty of crimes, after they 



w Matt, xxvii, 37; John xix, 19, 20. ®>Life Domit., c. 10; Life Caligula, c. 32. 

n History, llv, p. 523. 

as Matt, xxvii, 57, 58; Mark xv, 43-46; Luke xxiii, 50-53; John xix, 38. 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 399 

have been punished, should be consigned to burial." 29 Ulpianus* says: 
11 The bodies of those who suffered capital punishment are not to be re- 
fused to their friends ;" and Augustus says, "At this day the bodies of 
persons in question are not buried unless permission has first been 
sought and granted. And sometimes it is not granted, especially in the 
case of those condemned for treason." " The bodies of those who suffer 
punishment are to be given to any requesting them for interment." 30 

c) Burial. With the Jews, criminals were executed with- 
out the gates of the city wall, and were buried near the place 
of execution. The Jews, however, were accustomed to bury 
the bodies of criminals before the set of sun, and under no cir- 
cumstances to allow the body to be exposed to birds of prey, 
or to molder on the cross under the disintegrating action of the 
sun and air. The law of Moses required that when death had 
been thus inflicted, the body " should not remain all night on 
the tree, but should be buried on the day of the execution." 31 
Hence Josephus, referring to the siege of Jerusalem, mentions 
the infamy of the Idumseans, who were continually murdering 
those within the city, and leaving their bodies unburied. He 
says: 

" They proceeded to that degree of impiety as to cast away their dead 
bodies without burial, although the Jews used to take so much care of 
the burial of men, that they took down those who were condemned and 
crucified, and buried them before the going down of the sun." 32 

I) Garments. The distribution of the garments of the cru- 
cified was a matter of the Koman law. Dean Alf ord remarks : 
"The garments of the executed were by law the perquisites of 
the soldiers on duty." As in the crucifixion of our Lord, there 
were employed one centurion as commander, and four soldiers 
of the ranks ; the four divided between them the garments of 
Jesus. 33 



*Domitius Ulpianus (A. D. 170) entered upon public life under Septimus 
Severus and Oaracalla (193-217). Ulpianus's Digest of Julian consists of excerpts 
from his works, and the Fragments are known as Tutuli ex Corpore Ulpiani. 

w Rawl. Bampton Lectures, p. 402. 3° Cited by Rawlinson, Id., p. 402, note 62. 

* Deut. xxi, 22, 23; comp. Acts v, 30; x, 39; xiii, 29; Gal. iil, 13; 1 Pet. ii, 24. 

&Wars, iv, 5, 2. 

^Alford's Greek Testament, Vol I, in loco, 6th ed; comp. John xix, 23, p. 899. 

26 



400 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

rj) Enrollments. Two enrollments 34 of the Jews in Pales- 
tine were made by Cyrenius (Quirinius) under the order of the 
Emperor Augustus ; the jwst about the time of the birth of 
Jesus, B. C. 4, which was to ascertain the population of the 
country; the second, about ten years afterward, in A. D. 6, 
corrected chronology, which was to ascertain the property of 
the people. The peculiarity of both instances is, that the two 
registries were Eoman in authority and purpose, but entirely 
Jewish in the manner in which the enrollments were effected ; 
that is, each person and family, in order to be enrolled, had 
first to go to the native tribal territory, wherever else the 
residence might be. Hence Joseph and Mary, who were resi- 
dent at Nazareth, repaired to the territory of Judah ; and, by 
this simple circumstance, Jesus was born at Bethlehem 35 of 
Judaea in exact fulfillment of prophetic prediction. 36 Then, 
withal, there were two different kinds of tax imposed upon the 
people ; the one called " a tribute " tax, which Caesar usually 
exacted of a conquered country. The Pharisees referred to 
this when they asked Jesus: "Is it lawful to give tribute to 
Caesar, or not ? ,,S7 The other tax, called didrachma, was given in 
support of the temple service, and is referred to by Matthew : 
" When they that received the half -shekel came to Peter and 
said, Doth not your Master pay the half-shekel?" 38 

In recording time, the Evangelists employ two distinct sys- 
tems of notation. Both methods were military in character. 
§ 282. Nota- ^he distinctive references made in the New Tes- 
tions of Time, tament are to three particulars; viz., the several 
watches of the night, an interval of days when inclusive or 
exclusive of the extremes in which certain events occurred, 
and an indefinite date fixed in a certain year in the epoch of a 
given ruler. 

0) Night-watches. The Jews originally divided the night 
into three watches, extending from sunset to ten o'clock; 

»* Luke ii, 1-3 ; Acts v, 37. » Luke ii, 4. » Micah v, 2. 

«7 Matt, xxii, 17. M Matt, xvli, 24. 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 401 

thence to two; and thence to sunrise. Jesus said: "Blessed 
are those servants whom the Lord when he cometh shall find 
watching. . . . And if he shall come in the second watch, 
and if in the third, and find them so, blessed are those 
servants." n 

Upon the other hand, the Romans observed four night- 
watches, beginning at six o'clock in the evening, and termi- 
nating every three hours severally, corresponding with the 
statement of " four quaternions of soldiers," m mentioned as in 
service of Herod Antipas's army. But in consequence of the 
dominance of the Romans over the Jews, the latter naturally 
conformed to the Roman usage, and computed the fourth 
watch in dividing the night. So Mark says : 

" Watch therefore, for ye know not when the lord of the house com- 
eth, whether at even, or at midnight, or at cock-crowing [i. e., three 
o'clock], or in the morning." 41 

t) Intervals. In case of an interval of several days between 
two events, the Romans excluded the two extreme days in 
which the two events happened, while the Jews in their count 
included them. Thus between the promise of Christ and the 
realization of his transfiguration, there is a twofold enumera- 
tion by the Evangelists, Matthew reckoning the time between 
exclusively, "After six days;" 42 while Luke reckons inclusively, 
"About eight days after." ffl 

k) Reigns. The Romans dated important events according 
to a given year in a given emperor's reign; but the Jews 
reckoned according to the high priesthood of their theocracy. 
Now, Luke observes both methods in one notation, including 
all the several rulers in Palestine thus : 

" Now, in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius 
Pilate being governor of Judaea, and Herod [Antipas] being tetrarch of 
Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Itursea and 

3» Luke xii, 37, 38. *° Acts xii, 4; Matt, xiv, 25. 

« Mark xiii, 35. « Matt, xvii, 1. « Luke ix, 28. 



402 Histoeical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Trachonitis, and Lysanius tetrarch of Abilene, in the high priesthood of 
Annas and Caiaphas, the word of the Lord came unto John, the son of 
Zacharias, in the wilderness," 44 etc. 

Now, it should be specially remarked that such unusual 
particularization as this, if false, furnishes the readiest possible 
means of detection; but on the contrary, if true, especially 
when introduced into the text incidentally without a word of 
explanation, it furnishes powerful evidence that these Scrip- 
tures are thoroughly historical, and were written at the time 
usually ascribed to them. 

Yery subtle but ingrain evidence of the antiquity of a 
given document is to be found in the language which it em- 
ploys. There are local characteristics and forms 

;§283. Test t J 

of of expression which belong to and mark the age, 

anguage. guc k as Latinisms and Hebraisms in Palestine, 
which prevailed in the vocabulary and literature of the period, 
taken up into Greek forms of language, relating to the prac- 
tical affairs of life and religion, which convey by necessary 
implication the thought of the Roman and Hebrew people 
living together in one body politic. They serve to illustrate, 
as no other method could do, a society composed of two differ- 
ent civilizations, having two classes of institutions, two kinds 
of authority, two systems of laws, two procedures in court, 
two sorts of punishments; all evidencing the peculiar condi- 
tion of the country at the time of Christ and his apostles, and 
at no period since, when Roman power held the occupancy 
and the supremacy in the land of the Jews, all of which was 
brought to a perpetual end within forty years after the cruci- 
fixion of Jesus Christ. It is a powerful verification both of 
the antiquity and authenticity of these historical writings, that 
they should find such remarkable confirmation by both Jewish 
and classic historians of fame. But that which renders the 
case incontrovertible is the fact that the very language 

"Luke iii, 1, 2; cf. Ant. xviii, 4, 6 ; xvii, 8, 1, and 11, 4. 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 403 



imbedded in the accounts of the Gospels proves their age 

by something more substantial than the mere color of the 

period. 

It has been forcefully said by the scholarly Trench, that 

" Words are fossil history" and that " any one with skill to 

analyze the language might re-create for himself the history of a 

people speaking that language" * The principle applies to the 

historical 'New Testament without question. It is the function 

of language to give expression to the thought and life of those 

with whom it was vernacular. 

Some illustrations are now to be furnished. We thus 

have the word — 

Centurion, meaning the commander of a hundred soldiers of 
the Roman army. 46 

Legion, usually a great but indefinite number; strictly 4,200 
to 6,000 soldiers. 47 

Pradorium, the official judgment-seat among Romans for the 
trial of causes. 48 

Custody, a guard set to watch and keep prisoners in their 
power. 49 

Census, a registering of population, or rating of property val- 
uation for taxing. 50 51 ® 

Quadrans, a small Roman coin worth an English "farthing" 
or an American half- cent. 53 



46 Study of Words, p. 96, Eng. ed. 

LATIN. GREEK. ENGLISH. 

46 Centurio, K€PTvpl<av, centurion, 

47 Legio, \eyetip, a legion, 

« Prcetorium, vpairdtpiov, judgment-hall, etc., 

^Custodia, Kovcrrwbia, custody, watch, 

w Census, k9iv<to$ tax enumeration. 

61 Descriptio, airoypacpi) , enrollment or registration. 

nprofiteor, airoy pd<f>e<rdai to make a public return, 

m Quadrans, Kodpdvrt]^, farthing, half-cent, 



REFERENCE. 

Mark xv, 39, 44, 45. 
Matt, xxvi, 53; Luke 

viii, 30. 
John xviii, 28; xix, 

9, etc. 
Matt, xxvii, 65, 66; 
Matt, xvii, 25. 
Acts v, 37. 
Luke ii, 1-3, 5. 
Matt, v, 26; Mark 

xii,42. 



404 



Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



Assarius, another Koman coin of about the same value as that 

of the quadrans. 54 
Denarius, translated by the English " penny," and worth about 

two cents in America. 55 
Drachma, a silver coin of the Greeks, worth about sixteen 

cents in American money. 56 
Flagello, to scourge, a peculiar form of lashing prisoners both 

Jewish and Roman. 57 
Executioner, an officer of the body-guard to carry out a judi- 
cial death sentence. 58 
Besides these words, which are mostly of Roman origin, 
there are others employed in the New Testament derived from 
the Hebrew or later Aramaic language, the letters of which 
the Jews brought with them from their captivity. Thus we 
have — 

Corban, a sacrificial or dedicatory gift of the temple service. 59 
Rabbi, which means "My Master;" 60 and Eabboni, "My 

great Master." 61 
Baca, a senseless, empty-headed fellow; a fool; one who is 

worthless. 62 
Bar-jona, a Hebrew formula to express " son of Jona." m 



LATIN. 


GREEK, 


ENGLISH. 




REFERENCE 


^Assarius, 


aua&piov, 


farthing, a half -cent. 




Matt, x, 29; Luke 
xii, 6. 


55 Denarius, 
50 Drachma, 


drjudpiov, 


penny, 

[lost] " piece of silver," 




Matt, xviii, 28; xx, 
2, 9, 10, 13; Mark 
vi,37. 

Luke xv, 8, 9. 


57 Flagello, 


(ppayeWou, 


i, to scourge, 






Matt, xxvii, 26 ; Mark 
xv, 15. 


58 Speculator, 


<nr€Kov\&T(ap, executioner. 






Mark vi, 27. 


HEBREW. 




GREEK. 


ENGLISH 


REFERENCE. 


6 TO 

60 13^, 




Kopftav, 
pajS/Sl, 


"Corban,' 
" Rabbi." 


(j 


Mark vii, 11. 
John iii, 2. 


mi^3} 




'paPfiovvl, 'pafifiovl, 


Rabboni, 




John xx, 16; x, 51* 


62 Kp T ">. 




'Pcucd, 


a worthless fel- 
low, a simple- 
ton, Matt, v, 22 


» mr-ia, 




Tbapduva, 


Bar-Jona. 
Jona, 


i son of 

Matt, xvi, 17. 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 405 

Boanerges, sons of thunder, a designation applied by Jesus to 

James and John. 64 
Kephas, a rock; a name given to Peter by Christ, after his 

great confession. 65 
Gehenna, a valley running east and west, lying south of 

Jerusalem. 66 
Talitha cumi, "Damsel, arise;" words spoken by Jesus to the 

daughter of Jairus. 67 
Ephphatha, "Be thou opened;" Christ's address to the deaf 

and dumb man. 68 
Hosanna, the shout of the multitude on the mount of Olives, 

near Jerusalem. 69 
Jot ('), the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet; and tittle, 

the little tick on the smallest Hebrew letter. 70 
By so much as the sacred biographers represent in their 
several Gospels the language employed by the people of the 
country in which they wrote during that particular period, by 
so much do they demonstrate both the antiquity and the 
historicity of their writings. 

Sudden Changes in the Political Geography of Palestine. 
Frequent changes in the rulers and realms of the country, 
occurring at brief intervals, necessitated changes also in the 
form of the local government. First, there was an unbroken 
kingdom over all the land; then through the king's death 
came divisions of the territory, with conversion into three 



HEBREW. 


GREEK. 




ENGLISH. REFERENCE. 


64 ^;n- , ;3 


Boapepyt?, 




" sonS of thun- Mark iii, 17. 
der," 


66 K£T3, 


~Kri<pas, 




Cephas, John i, 42. 405 


66 D'arrjj 


Tetvva, 




"Gehenna " [fig- 
ure of Perdi- Matt, v, 29, 30. 
tion], 


"^pKiT^tp 


TaKida KoO/xt, 




"Maiden, arise," Mark v, 41. 


^nnanx 


4cp(padd y 




Ephphatha, Mark vii, 34. 


"wn^t'in 


oxravvb., 




Matt.xxi,9; Mark 
xi, 9; John xii, 
13. 
one jot or one 

tittle, Matt - v> 18 - 


^nxpp.iNnrm-Tr 


Kara, ev 4\ fxla 


icepala, 



406 Historical Evidence of the Kew Testament. 

principalities of unequal sizes; then two of the successors 
were deposed and the third ruler died, when two principalities 
84 became Koman provinces, and the third was 

of transferred to an adjacent kingdom; then fol- 

lowed unification of the two provincial divisions 
with the same kingdom which now covered the land; then, 
after three years, the king died, and the kingdom became pro- 
vincial, and was governed by Roman procurators ; when, after 
a few years more, a new kingdom was erected out of a portion 
of the original territory, and the rest remained a Roman 
province until the end of the Jewish nationality, when all 
became Roman again. 

The point of the argument to be observed here is, that the 
four Evangelists, without the least strain or effort, wrote their 
several G-ospels with a strict understanding of the times, and 
with entire inerrancy of statement. They refer to the several 
rulers and governments without any explanation of the changes, 
in the most familiar and incidental manner, as only those 
could do who lived in the midst of these changes and compli- 
cations, as the most celebrated writers absolutely failed to do, 
such as Tacitus, Dion Cassius, and Celsus* did, who wrote 
shortly after the Apostolic Age. This justly puts the seal of 
truth upon the antiquity and authenticity of the Gospels. 

When the nativity of Jesus occurred, the whole land was 
one consolidated kingdom ruled by Herod the Great. The 
king probably died within a few months, and his kingdom 
was divided and transferred to his three sons ; but the king- 
dom was changed, one-half becoming an Mhnarchy, ruled by 
his eldest son Archelaus, and the other half divided about 
equally and converted into two Tetr archies, governed respect- 
ively by Antipas and his brother Philip II. 71 The ethnarchy of 
Archelaus was constituted of the several geographical divisions 
of the country known as Idumaea, Judaea, and Samaria. That 

* See chap, iii, p. 69, $37, note, 
ra Josephus, Ant. xvii, c. 11, $4. 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 407 

portion which fell to Antipas was the tetrarchy constituted of 
the two geographical divisions called Galilee, a region on the 
west of the Galilean sea, and a narrow tract stretching from 
the Sea of Galilee on the east of the Jordan River and the 
Dead Sea. The tetrarchy of Philip embraced that region of 
country to the east of the Galilean Sea and Lake Hulon or 
Merom, known as " Batanaea, Trachonitis, Auranitis, and some 
parts of Jamnia." 72 

Changes came in these several administrations at brief 
and irregular periods. In A. D. 6, in corrected chronology, 
Archelaus was deposed and banished, and his ethnarchy was 
reduced to a Roman province, governed by Coponius, Procu- 
rator of Syria. 73 The two tetrarchies of Antipas and Philip 
continue as tetrarchies. Then, in the year 34, Philip died, 
and leaving no son to succeed him in the government, his ter- 
ritory became a Roman province united with that of Syria. 74 
In the year 37, Caligula, having become emperor at Rome, 
made the grandson of Herod the Great, named Agrippa, king 
of that country which had been the tetrarchy of Philip, and 
seems to have promised to add the tetrarchy of Lysanius. 75 In 
the year 39, Antipas was deposed and banished, and his 
tetrarchy was incorporated into the kingdom of his nephew 
Agrippa. 76 In the year 41, Claudius succeeded Caligula on 
the imperial throne at Rome, and for special services rendered 
by Agrippa I in his interests, the emperor added "all that 
country over which Herod [the Great], who was his grand- 
father, had reigned; that is, Judsea and Samaria;" also add- 
ing Abila of Lysanias's tetrarchy thereto. 77 But now, in the 
year 44, Agrippa I died, and his territory, which included 
all Palestine, became a Roman province; and Claudius 
"sent Cuspius Fadus to be procurator of Judaea, and the 
whole of the kingdom." 78 Finally, in the year 53, Claudius 

™Wars, B. ii, c. 6, $3. ™Ib. ii, 8, 1. 

"Ant. xviii, 4, 6. ™ Ant. xviii, 6, 10; xix, 5, 1. 

™Ant. xviii, 4, 6, end; c. 7, $ 2; Wars, ii, 9, 6. « Ant. xix, 5, 1. 

78/6. xix, 9, 1, 2; Wars, ii, 11, 6. 



408 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

bestowed upon the son of Agrippa I, known as Agrippa 
II, the two tetrarchies of Philip and Lysanius; 79 and in the 
year 54, Nero, becoming emperor, added several cities named 
Abila, Tiberias, Tarichgea, and Julias, 80 with some fourteen 
villages. 81 All the remaining territory continued provincial 
governed by procurators, until the close of the Eoman-Jewish 
war in A. D. 70, when the Jewish nationality was completely 
destroyed, and the whole land once more became Roman. 

A SUMMARY. 

1. An Undivided Kingdom, ruled by a native king of the 

Jews, known as Herod the Great. 

2. A Divided Domain: an ethnarchy and two tetrarchies 

organized for Herod's three sons. 

3. A Fractional Change: in the year 6, Archelaus's eth- 

narchy becomes a Roman province. 

4. A Tetrarchy Reduced: in 34, Philip dies, and his tetrarchy 

becomes a Roman province. 

5. A Reconstructed Kingdom : in 37, Agrippa I is made king 

over Philip's old tetrarchy. 

6. Accessions to Agrippa I: he receives from Caligula, Anti- 
pas's Galilee and Peraea. 

7. Additional Accessions: in 51, Agrippa receives from Clau- 

dius, Samaria and Judaea and Ablia. 

8. Kingdom Abolished : in 44, Agrippa dies, and his whole 

domain now becomes provincial. 

9. A New Kingdom: in 53, Agrippa II becomes king over 

tetrarchies of Philip and Lysanius. 

10. Accessions to Agrippa II: the Emperor Nero adds four 

cities and fourteen villages. 

11. Jewish Nation Destroyed: in A. D. 70, the Jews were 

expatriated, and all becomes Roman again. 

19 Ant. xx. 7, 1; Wars, ii, 12, 8. so Wars, ii, 13, 2. ^Ant. xx, 8, 4. 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 409 



The Evidential Value of these Facts as Regards the 
Four Gospels. 

The Evangelists make frequent reference to the rulers of 
the land, calling them properly by name, and sometimes even 
referring to a given realm; but they never 
pause to explain changes in the government, ' induc- 
or what was the occasion by which rulers came 
to office. They invariably assume the political situation to 
be just as it was, and as it was understood to be by their con- 
temporaries to whom they addressed their writings. To 
them no explanations were requisite. But this course would 
obviously be a most dangerous procedure for any writers 
to gain credence unless the Gospels were true. If true, the 
writers required no better security than the actual history of 
the times, upon which they evidently rested their case in 
open disregard for their own fame. 

Upon the other hand, Josephus, a contemporary and a 
Jewish historian, not only corroborates the existing facts of 
the Gospels as assumed, but makes ample explanations how 
the political changes came to pass. Closely and carefully does 
he follow up the transitions in the political geography of the 
whole country, giving the order, the occasion and details re- 
specting the changes in government, as well as the names of 
the rulers and their respective realms. So far from there 
being any conflict between the secular and the sacred writers, 
Josephus supplements the statements of the Evangelists. But 
these authors do not follow the same lines of history, as they 
have not the same ends in view. Josephus wrote expressly 
the history of the Jewish nation ; the Evangelists wrote exclu- 
sively of the founding of Christianity. 

It is fairly presumable that none but those living in the 
midst of such abrupt and stirring events leading to such 
apparent complications and transitions, could have composed 



410 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

a true narrative of the times and touch upon the political situ- 
ation without error. For if neither Tacitus, the Roman writer 
of fame who lived in the close of the first century, and wrote 
just after the Apostolic Age; nor Celsus, of the second century, 
who was the contemporary of the Apostolic Fathers, and wrote 
purposely to destroy the Christian religion; nor yet Dion Cas- 
sius, of the third century, and a contemporary of the Chris- 
tian Apologists, who wrote his history in Greek, could really 
understand to unravel the governmental complications of 
the Apostolic Period— for they made grave mistakes, which 
they would not have made had they lived contemporaneously 
with the events they describe, and in the very land where 
they occurred — how is it that the Evangelists, simple in their 
character and unpretentious in literary fame, were entirely 
successful and inerrant in allusion to these events in writing 
the Gospels? This challenges critical consideration. There 
is but one answer: They lived and wrote in the very epoch 
when the events themselves occurred in the current history ', and 
hence were familiar with the facts which they record. 

The peculiarities arising out of the Roman and Jewish 
civilizations existing side by side — the one in domination, and 
the other in subjection, with all that that implies — is not the 
least important circumstance in proof of the antiquity and 
the historicity of the Gospels. The ingrain evidence is found 
in every fact, whether prominent or of minor mention, but es- 
pecially the occurrences of incidental record, which thread 
through all the contents of those writings, as in the warp and 
woof of a fabric. 

Besides these proofs of historical character, there is inter- 
nal evidence imbedded in the very words employed in the Gos- 
pels illustrative of the two civilizations composing one com- 
munity or State, as seen in the tri-superscription placed on the 
cross of Jesus. It is further demonstrated in the terms of 
usage in their laws, in the processes of their courts of trial, in 
the penalties they imposed for crime, in the designation of 



Unique Condition of Palestine for Fifty Years. 411 

the officers who inflicted punishments, and in the different 
modes of execution, as shown by Livy the Roman, and Jose- 
phus the Jewish historian. It is further found in their divisions 
of time, their different night-watches, their inclusive and exclu- 
sive dates, their fixed epochs according to the accession of 
chief rulers and high priests. It is also discoverable in the 
Augustan order for the enrollment of the Jews; a Roman re- 
quirement, but conducted in the Jewish method, which 
brought Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem in their tribal terri- 
tory in exact fulfillment of prophetic prediction. The gov- 
ernmental history of that land during the first half-century of 
the Christian era is itself a monument in proof of the accu- 
racy of the writers composing the several gospels, as well as 
of the period in which those writers lived and wrote. 

No amount of reasoning can cancel these facts as unhis- 
torical. Can any candid mind ignore the force of the facts ? 
It is not in the power of genius to translate such facts into fic- 
tion, as is implied in the legendary and mythological theories 
of the Gospels. Can all this detail, running through the con- 
tents of these sacred writings as verified, he true, and yet the 
record itself he false f Can a conclusion to the contrary he 
verified on the facts adduced? 



CHAPTER XV. 

THE KOMAK KULEES OF THE JEWS IN THE 
NEW TESTAMENNT. 

a) Civil Administrations: Emperors, Legate, Procurators, Procon- 
suls. 

/S) Roman Administrators Related to the History of the New Testa- 
ment: Their Character, the Occurrences and Incidents of 
Their Administrations. 

I. Emperors: Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, 
Nero. 
II. Legate: Quirinius (Cyrenius). 

III. Procurators: Pontius Pilate, Antonius Felix, Porcius 

Festus. 

IV. Proconsuls: Sergius Paul us in Cyprus ; Gallio in 

Achai'a; and the "Proconsuls in Asia." 
413 



Chapter XV. 

THE ROMAN RULERS OF THE JEWS IN THE 
NEW TESTAMENT. 

§ 286. Roman Officers of Palestine. 

In reality it is altogether in minute points that the difference is to be 
perceived between truth and fabrication. — Whately. 

Every quotation from Josephus, Tacitus, o-r Suetonius; every fresh 
archaeological exploration in Palestine, Asia Minor, or Greece, only 
serves to illustrate this minute accuracy with which their titles are 
given to Roman procurators and proconsuls, Greek " politarchs," 
and Asiatic aediles, and demonstrates the fidelity with which the 
dual system of government, of military forces, and of religious 
life, are described, as blended together and coexistent, side by 
side, at the only period when that coexistence was possible, among 
the strangest of all strange people, the Jewish nation. — Maclear. 

The agreement to be traced between sacred and profane narratives is to 
be found chiefly, if not solely, in harmonious representations with 
respect to facts which, in the Scripture narrative, are incidentally 
mentioned as names, offices, and characters of political personages 
to whom there happens to be allusion. The value of such confir- 
mation is not less, but rather greater, than that of a more direct 
confirmation, which would result from an accordance with main 
facts, because it is a task of extremest difficulty for any one but 
an honest contemporary writer to maintain accuracy in the wide 
field of incidental allusion ; and because such exactness in such 
matters is utterly at variance with the mythical spirit of which 
according to [one] of the latest phases of unbelief, the narrative of 
the New Testament is the product. If it can be shown that the 
detail is correct, and the exactness that of persons intimately ac- 
quainted with the history of the time and bent on faithfully 
recording it, the [contrary] theory may be considered as com- 
pletely subverted and disproved. It is important to bear in mind 
in this connection the fact that there is no period in the whole 
range of ancient history whereof we possess a more full and 
exact knowledge than we do of the first century of our era. — 
George Rawlinson. 
27 415 



416 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



ARGUMENT. 

That the Romans gained by conquest and maintained a political suprem- 
acy over the Jewish nation, in and after B. C. 63, is a fact which 
is thoroughly known in history. Thenceforth the two distinct and 
dissimilar civilizations coexisted side by side in one country and 
community, the Jews being held in subordination by the presence 
of the Roman army of occupation. Many striking coincidences 
occur in statement between sacred and secular narratives of 
these times, appertaining to the civic offices and ruling officers 
mentioned in the New Testament. This subordination and 
domination of the Jews could have occurred in but one definite 
period of time. If, then, it shall be found that, however incidentally 
the fact is mentioned, and that notwithstanding under the re- 
markable changes occurring in the government and in the political 
divisions of the country, the Roman rulers are all properly dis- 
tinguished and placed in order, in the right period and divis- 
ion, if also events of prominence are correctly indicated as 
having occurred accordant with accredited secular history, then 
two inductions are logically inevitable : viz. , that the sacred writers 
have given us an historical account of these public affairs, so far 
as they go, and that it is evident and obvious that the sacred 
writers wrote as contemporary with the facts recorded of which 
they had a proper knowledge. These inductions warrant the an- 
tiquity and historicity of these Scriptures. 

1. Emperors. 3. Procurators. 

2. Legatus. 4. Proconsuls. 

From the characteristics of society in the Jewish land we 

pass to the consideration of its political Eoman rulers. The 

emperors were the supreme heads of the em- 

8 Ruiers°and n pi re > holding the office for life. Augustus, the 

the New g rs t Roman Emperor, effected a division of the 

Testament. x 

provinces between himself and the Senate. Those 
provinces which stood most in need of military force were re- 
tained by him, and ruled by those who were his exclusive 
appointments. They were administered by procurators or 
legates; the procurator had military power to govern when 
necessary, but the legate was a civic officer. A procurator 
had an indefinite tenure of office, while that of the legate was 
limited from three to five years. The more peaceful provinces 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 417 

were assigned by the Senate to government of proconsuls, 
who were civil officers, and whose tenure was for only one 
year. The inferior offices not mentioned in the New Testa- 
ment have no place in this historical investigation. 

EPITOME. 

I. Emperors: Augustus, B. C. 27-14 A. D; Tiberius, 14-37; Caius Ca- 
ligula, 37-41; Claudius, 41-54; Nero, 54-68. 
II. Legate: Sulpicius Quirinius [Gr. "Cyrenius"], B. C. 4-1 A. D. and 
6-11 as governor of Syria,* and Commissioner Extraordinary as 
Registrar of Palestine, in the second appointment. 

III. Procuratores : Pontius Pilate, A. D. 26-36; Antonius Felix, 53-60; 

Porcius Festus, 60-62. 

IV. Proconsuls: 1 Sergius Paulus of Cyprus, 46; Junius Annseus Gal- 

lio of Achai'a,t 53 ; "Proconsuls of Asia." 

I. Emperors. 

The emperors, whom the Romans called Imperatores, exer- 
cised a supreme and universal authority over the nations and 
individual subiects of the empire, claiming as their 

J r ' ° §288. The 

function the power of life and death, but also the imperial 
right to extend that power to certain subordinates 
governing the provinces. % The emperor was also invested, as 
chief pontiff or high priest, with the care of the religion of the 
State. In honor of the great Caius Julius Caesar the first five 
emperors assumed as the imperial title, the family name 
" Caesar, " § which became extinct in Nero. To this title was 
added " Augustus," in honor of the first and famous Emperor 

*Legatus August! propraetore in Syria. 

+ Achaia, as the Romans called Greece in distinction from Macedonia and 
Illyria on the north. See Lewin's Paul, i, 269, 291, note. 

{The Jewish Sanhedrin, a judicial body, seems to have been deprived of 
their power of life and death over Jews in Judaea, and this power was conferred 
upon the procurators of that province. Josephus says: "Coponius, one of the 
equestrian order, was sent as a procurator, having the power of death put into his 
hands by Caesar." ( Wars, ii, 8, 1.) The Jews confessed to Pilate: "It is not lawful 
for us to put any man to death;" and Pilate himself said to Jesus: "Knowest thou 
not that I have the power to release thee, and have power to crucify thee?" (John 
xviii, 31; xix, 10.) 

$ Observe the German Kaiser for emperor, and the Russian Czar, a corruption 
of "Caesar." 

^Avd&rraTo?, Acts xiii, 7; but sometimes called also propraetor. 



418 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

of the Romans. Both titles are mentioned in the New Testa- 
ment. Some of the emperors, such as Augustus, Trajan, and 
Hadrian, are considered to have been men of superior qualities 
and noble characteristics; but others, as Tiberius, Caligula, 
Claudius, Nero, Yitellius, and Domitian, the famous historian 
of the empire, Edward Gibbons, affirms "are condemned to 
everlasting infamy." 

1. Augustus Caesar was the first Roman emperor. He was 

nephew of the great statesman and warrior, Caius Julius Caesar 

(B. C. 100-44). Augustus was born B. C. 63, 

§ 289. The v . . . 

Emperors and he was named for his father Caius Octavius, 
ndivi ua y. ^^ gu | )se q Uen ^y assumed the name Caius Julius 
Caesar Octavius. He, with Antony and Lepidus, composed the 
temporary government known as the Triumvirate. But the 
relations of the three became strained, and upon the retiracy 
of Lepidus, a struggle ensued for the supremacy between 
Augustus and Antony, which finally culminated in the naval 
battle at Actium, B. C. 31, when Augustus was declared to be 
Imperator by the Eoman Senate. But as he now offered to 
resign this supreme power, they conferred upon him the title 
"Augustus." 2 This imperial name, meaning august or revered, 
was rendered in the Greek Sebastos, 3 and was a title afterwards 
conferred upon his successors as a matter of heredity. 4 Some- 
times in history he is called Octavius. He possessed superior 
judgment and tact in the management of public affairs, and 
died A. D. 14, much honored and beloved. 

The history of this great emperor comes in touch with 
sacred history by reason of his decree causing a registration of 
the population to be made in Judaea at the time of the nativity 
of Christ. Luke in his Gospel refers to him thus: "Now it 
came to pass in those days, there went out a decree from Cobsar 
Augustus that all the world should be enrolled."* It is a re- 



z'Lepa.GTbr, ("Augustus"), a title applied twice to Nero intheN.T.; viz., in 
Acts xxv, 21, 25. 

3 Suetonius, Augustus, 7. 4 lb. Tiberius, 26. &Lukeii, 1. 



Romajst RdLERs of the Jews in New TESTAMENT. 419 

markable circumstance that this decree and the registration 
which it ordered brought to pass at Bethlehem, accordant with 
ancient prophecy, the birth of Jesus ; for Joseph and Mary were 
required to go to Judaea, their own tribal territory, for registra- 
tion, according to the Jewish method of enrollment. 

2. Tiberius was the second Emperor of the Romans. About 
two years before the death of Caesar Augustus he associated 
with himself his friend Tiberius, with a view to his becoming his 
successor to the crown. Accordingly, Tiberius was reigning 
when the Baptist was preaching in the wilderness, and also dur- 
ing the ministry of Jesus. Three allusions are made to this 
emperor in the historical New Testament. In the one instance 
he is mentioned by name, in the others by title. In fixing the 
date of John's ministry Luke says : " Now in the fifteenth year 
of the reign of Tiberius Caesar . . . the word of the Lord 
came unto John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness. " 6 In 
the second instance, Christ's enemies asked him : " Is it lawful 
for us to give tribute to Caesar or not? " 7 And the third allusion 
to Tiberius was when Jesus was before Pilate, and the Jews 
shouted : " If thou release this man, thou art not Caesar's friend ; 
every one that maketh himself king speaketh against Caesar." 8 
Thus near the beginning and middle, and at the end of Christ's 
ministry, a reference is recorded to this Emperor Tiberius. 

3. Caius Caligula, the third emperor, is not mentioned or 
alluded to in the New Testament. Secular history, however, 
is replete with the narrative of his foul, despotic, desperate 
deeds. He insisted upon having his own statue set up in the 
temple grounds of the Jews at Jerusalem, that they should be 
compelled to accord him divine honors. In A. D. 41, says 
Josephus, Caligula 

" Asserted his own divinity and insisted on greater honors to be paid 
him by his subjects than are due to mankind, . . . and had the bold- 
ness to call himself the brother of Jupiter." 9 "He gave orders [to 
Vitellius, president of Syria] to make an invasion of Judsea with a great 

» Luke iii, 1, 2. » Matt, xxii, 17; Luke xxiii, 2. e John xix, 12. 

9 Antiquities, xix, 1,1; xviii, 8, 1, 2; comp. xvili, 8, 2, 7. 



420 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

body of troops, and if they would admit his statue willingly, to erect it 
in the temple of God ; but if they were obstinate, to conquer them by 
war, and then do it." 10 

The emperor, however, was finally dissuaded from his pur- 
pose by the influence of his special friend, Herod Agrippa I, 
who was a zealous Jew. n Caligula died by assassination. ^ 

4. Claudius, the fourth and " feeble-minded " emperor, was 
fifty years old when he ascended the throne of Kome. He 
succeeded to the imperial office through the personal influence 
of Herod Agrippa I, who was the first to nominate him to the 
Eoman Senate. It proved, however, that the emperor was 
governed by his f reedmen. Suetonius says : 

" Among his f reedmen the greatest favorite was the eunuch Posides ; 
. . . next to him, if not equal in favor, was Felix," who is mentioned 
in Acts xxiii and xxiv. 13 

Luke represents that Claudius became emperor at the time 
when Paul and Silas were making the second apostolic journey 
in Asia Minor and along Eastern Europe. This Evangelist 
refers twice to this emperor, and each reference has its historic 
interest. The first relates to the prediction of a great fam- 
ine; the second to a certain edict of Claudius expelling the 
Jews indiscriminately from the Capital. 

a) The Famine. Agabus, a Christian prophet journeying 
from Jerusalem toAntioch, "signified by the Spirit that there 
should be a great famine over all the world, which came to 
pass in the days of Claudius." 14 It is not particularly impor- 
tant to the historicity of the fact or the argument based upon 
it whether this famine predicted was local or universal; 
whether the words rendered "over all the world" 15 be taken 
in the extensive, or the restricted sense according to the usus 
of the Jews in Judaea; for it is clear that the Greeks also 
restricted this universal term to the Greek world, the Komans 

w Antiquities, xviii, 8, 2. " lb. xviii, 8, 7, 8. '» Suetonius, Calig.,58. 

13 lb., Claud. 28; comp. Tacitus, Annals, xii, 54; and Joseph. Ant. xx, 7, 1; 
Wars, ii, 12, 8. 

"Acts xi, 28. ^"Eaea-dai e(f> 8\vp ttjv oUov/xivvv. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 421 

to the Roman world, and the Jews to the land of Palestine. 
In philological study it is of paramount importance that we 
apprehend the exact thought of the author. It is safe to assume 
that the term was employed in the restricted sense ; for how 
could the brethren of Antioch have the "ability" 16 to send 
relief to provision those at Jerusalem if they at Antioch were 
to be in the same strait? Nevertheless, a universal famine 
would harmonize all the historians on this subject, and meet 
the demands of the text in the most extensive sense. That 
the famine predicted by Agabus actually came to pass, is his- 
torically certain. We have not far to go for proof. 

Tacitus records : 

"A failure in the crops and famine consequent thereupon was re- 
garded as a prodigy. Nor were the complaints of the populace con- 
fined to murmurs ; they even gathered round the prince [Claudius] 
with tumultuous clamors while administering justice, and driving him 
to the extreme of the forum, pressed upon him in a violent manner ; 
till at length, by means of a compact body of soldiers, he forced his way 
through the incensed multitude. It is certain that there was then in 
Eome provision for only fifteen days." 17 

Josephus states: 

"Under these procurators [Cuspius Fadus and Tiberius Alexander] 
the great famine happened in Judsea." 18 "A little before the beginning of 
this war, when Claudius was Emperor of the Romans, and Ishmael was 
our high priest, and when so great a famine was come upon us," 19 etc. 

Eusebius adds: 

"Caius . . . was succeeded by Claudius in the sovereignty of 
the empire. In his reign there was a famine that prevailed over the 
whole world ; an event, indeed, which has been handed down by histo- 
rians [who] were very far from our doctrine ; and by which the predic- 
tion of the Prophet Agabus respecting the impending famine over the 
whole world received its fulfillment." 20 

Orosius places this famine, so distressing in Syria, in the 
fourth year of Claudius. 

16 Acts xi, 29, 30. "Annals, xii, 43. 

^Ant. xx, 5, 2; Fadus ruled 44-46; Alex. 46-48. »in«. ill, 15, 8. 

»Ecel. Hist. 11, c. 8. 



422 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

From the foregoing history the following facts become 
evident, and confirmatory of the prediction of Agabus, and the 
statement of Luke ; namely, that — 

1. The prediction uttered by Agabus and recorded by Luke 

occurred about the year 44. 

2. Josephus places a sore famine during the procuratorships 

of Fadus and Alexander. 

3. Fadus came into office in Judaea after the death of Agrippa I, 

near the close of 44. 

4. Orosius says the Syrian famine occurred in the fourth year 

of Claudius Caesar. 

5. The great famine certified by many historians, verifies the 

statement of Luke. 

p) The Expulsion. The second reference by Luke to the 

Emperor Claudius was occasioned by the meeting of Paul 

with Aquila and his wife Priscilla at Corinth, who, though 

Jewish Christians, had been banished from Home by the edict 

of Caesar. It was about the year 52 when Paul 

"Departed from Athens and came to Corinth. And he found a cer- 
tain Jew named Aquila, a man of Pontus by race, lately come from Italy 
with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had commanded all the Jews 
to depart from Rome." 21 

Suetonius mentions the fact and the immediate occasion 

for the expulsion of the Jews from the Capital. He says of 

Claudius : 

" He banished the Jews from Rome, who were continually making 
disturbances, Christ being their leader." 22 "He ordered that those 
who were banished from any province by the chief magistrate should be 
debarred from coming into the city or any part of Italy." 23 Tacitus, 
however, in speaking of Claudius says: " For expelling the astrologers 
[miracle-workers?] from Italy, a decree of the Senate was passed, 
severe but powerless." 24 

Orosius places this edict in the ninth year of Claudius, 
which would correspond with A. D. 49 or 50. 25 

Unquestionably, there were sharp disputations which arose 

ai Acts xviii, 1, 2. ** Claud. 25. ™Ib. 23. ^Annals, xti, 52. *>Hist. vii, 6. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 423 

between the Jewish Christians and the Jews of the old faith, 
about the keeping of the rabbinical law and about the accepted 
Messiah, Christ. But this discrimination between Jews seems 
not to have been made as yet at Rome. They were all ex- 
pelled together as Jews, as a race, and not with respect to 
their religion. Nevertheless, Tacitus aptly characterizes these 
decrees as "severe but powerless." They were usually soon 
canceled, or not carried out. That Luke's reference to the 
expulsion is strictly historical, is made evident by the records 
of several independent and secular historians. 

5. Nero was the fifth, and was the last, as he was the 
worst, of all the Caesars. 26 He was born in A. D. 37, 27 lost his 
father when three years of age, 28 was adopted at eleven by 
Claudius, 29 and succeeded to the imperial purple when but 
seventeen years old. 30 For his education he was placed under 
the instruction of the famous philosopher and statesman, 
Lucius Annaeus Seneca. 31 His reign began well, but in a few 
years his character began to disclose itself in a course of un- 
mitigated atrocities which he committed against the Capital, 
the senators, and the Christians and people. Tacitus says : 

"While tranquillity reigned abroad, abominable licentiousness was 
exhibited at Rome in the person of Nero." 32 "A rumor had become 
universally current at that very time, when the city was in flames, of 
Nero going on the stage of his private theater, and singing The Destruc- 
tion of Troy, assimilating the present disaster to that catastrophe of 
ancient times." 33 

But the infamies of Nero multiplied constantly, until at 
length the Senate openly declared him to be the enemy of the 
empire, 34 and the soldiery pursued him to the country as a 
refugee from justice, only to overtake him a wreck and a 
wretched suicide. 35 He died on July 11, A. D. 68. History 
fully verifies the sentence of Gibbon, who consigned the last 
four Caesars to "everlasting infamy." 36 

*« Sueton. Nero, 6, and p. 385; Vit. Galb. 1. w Sueton. lb. 6. 28 j . Nero, 6. 

» lb. Nero, 7. » lb. Nero, 8. 81 76. Nero, 7, 52. & Annals, xlii, 25. 

as lb. xv, 38, 39; Sueton. Nero, 38. 34S ue ton. Nero, 49. 

36 Sueton. Nero, 49 ; Tacit. Hist. 1, 4. 36 Decline and Fall, i, c. 3, p. 181. 



424 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

In the New Testament several allusions are made to Nero, 
not by personal name, but by the imperial title " Caesar " or 
"Augustus."* The Apostle Paul refers to him at least four 
times; thrice at Caesarea, when he said, "I appeal unto 
Caesar," 37 and once in his Epistle to the Philippians when 
sending his special salutations "to any of the household of 
Caesar." 38 Besides, there are four references made to this 
emperor by the Procurator Festus under the title of Caesar or 
Augustus ; and also once by King Agrippa II at Caesarea, as 
recorded by Luke.f 

In the statement then of what facts have these apostolic 
writings been vindicated as strictly historical by the citations of 
other authorites? The main facts may be summarized thus: 

1. The imperial decree of Augustus Caesar for enrollment, 

dates the nativity of Jesus. 

2. The date of the Baptist's ministry, heralding in that of 

Christ, gives its chronology. 

3. The conversation of Jesus with the Jews about the tribute 

money as lawfully Caesar's. 

4. The accusation against Jesus that claiming to be a king 

was speaking against Caesar. 

5. The prediction of Agabus of the famine realized in the 

fourth year of Claudius's reign. 

6. The expulsion from the Capital City of all Jews by reason 

of continual disputations. 

7. The one reference made by King Agrippa II to Nero as 

being then the reigning " Caesar." 

8. The four references to Nero as the emperor made also 

by the Koman procurator, Festus. 

Here, then, are eight facts recorded by sacred writers re- 
specting emperors and events touching twenty-one special 

* " Augustus " descended as an imperial title to all the Caesars from the first 
Roman Emperor, but some relinquished the title, 
f See Acts xxv, 12, twice, 21, 25; and xxvi, 32. 
w Acts xxv, 8, 10, 11. &Epis. to Philipp. iv, 22. 



Roman Hitlers of the Jews in New Testament. 425 

points which have confirmation from secular historians whose 
writings cover the same period. All the facts fit in exactly 
in the proper order and chronology respecting the Roman 
rulers and their reign, as also the references to current events. 
Are all these facts, personages, and references alike fictitious 
and unhistorical ? If anything can be proved by historical 
evidence to a reasonable mind, the conviction becomes resist- 
less, and there can be but one answer to the question. 
Further, it is just as evidential and obvious that these writ- 
ers — sacred and profane, the one class as much as the other — 
wrote in those times within which they purport to have written. 
Such evidence can not be set aside lightly, but is entitled to, 
and demands, as complete an explanation for our belief as is 
here given on the part of him who rejects the proof adduced 
and its induction — a reason, not mere assertion, not a specula- 
tion based on hypothesis or conjecture, but based on real his- 
torical grounds. 

§ 290. II. Legate. 

This officer was a civil functionary sent out from Rome by 
the emperor to govern a Roman province, and held office from 
three to five years. Quirinius was appointed twice to this 
office in Judaea for the purpose of making enrollments of the 
Jewish nation in the interests of the empire. In the first in- 
stance he numbered the population; in the second, he regis- 
tered the valuation of property. The Evangelist Luke records 
a note of both registrations. Of the first, a census associated 
with the birth of Christ, he says : " This was the first enroll- 
ment made by Quirinius" in distinction from the second one 
mentioned by Gamaliel : " that there rose up Judas of Galilee 
in the days of the enrollment." The first enrollment occurred 
B. C. 4, and the second A. D. 10. 39 In the latter Quirinius 
is said to have been Commissioner Extraordinary. 

3» Luke ii, 2; Acts v, 37. 



426 Historical Evidence of the JSTew Testament. 

§291.111. Procurators. 

A procurator 40 was a military ruler having charge of the 
imperial revenues, under the appointment of the emperor, with 
a life-tenure, unless recalled for cause. In rank the office was 
considered to be inferior to that of the proconsul and prefect. 
In the New Testament, as well as in the writings of Josephus, 
this officer is designated by the less strict and more generic 
title of "governor;" 41 a term also sometimes applied to a pro- 
consul. The procurator was invested with the authority to 
inflict capital punishment upon criminals ; but for such inflic- 
tion he was required to report the fact to the emperor at 
Kome, together with the circumstances which led up to the 
execution.* 

The procurators mentioned in the E"ew Testament are 
three in number ; namely, Pontius Pilate, A. D. 26-36; An- 
tonius Claudius Felix, 52-60; and Portius Festus, 60-62. 
These may be taken in the order of their official succession in 
the government of the province of Judaea. Any special cir- 
cumstances occurring under their respective administrations 
will furnish subjects for critical consideration, and when 
found to be authentic, will illustrate the historicity and the 
spirit of those times. 

I. Pontius Pilate. 

In ascertaining points of accordancy between sacred and 
secular histor}^ relating to this procurator, attention should 
be fixed upon three propositions to be verified ; and of these — 

* Eusebius says : "That nothing might escape him [the emperor], Pontius 
Pilate transmits to Tiberius an account of the circumstances concerning the 
resurrection of our Lord from the dead, the report of which had already spread 
throughout all Palestine." (E. H., B. ii, c. 2, p. 39.) Justin Martyr, in his first Apology 
appeals twice to these transmitted reports as then at Rome. He says: "That 
these things did happen, you can ascertain from the Acts of Pontius Pilate;" 
"And that he [Jesus] did those things you can learn from the Acts of Pontius Pi- 
late:" 1 (First Apol. cc. 85,48.) Tertullian adds: "All these things Pilate did to 
Christ; and now, in fact, a Christian in his convictions, he sent word of him to 
the reigning Caesar, who was at that time Tiberius." {Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 
Ill, c. 21, p. 35.) 

*> ijyefi(bv t 6. & Inexactly iTrlrpoiro^= ijyefju&v in the N. T. which is 

also a generic term for the office. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 427 



§ 292. 1 . The Procuratorship in Judsea in the Time of Christ as an Histor- 
ical Fact. 

The historical New Testament makes several distinct 
affirmations relating to his government of the Jews, viz. : 

"Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius 
Pilate being governor of Judsea, and Herod [Antipas] being tetrarch of 
Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of Itrursea and the region of 
Trachonitis, and Lysanias the tetrarch of Abilene, Annas and Caiaphas 
being the high priests [of the Jews], the word of God came unto 
John [the Baptist]." 42 

"Now when morning was come, all the chief priests and elders of 
the people took counsel against Jesus to put him to death ; and they 
bound him and led him away, and delivered him to Pontius Pilate the 
governor." • 

"For of a truth in this city, against thy Holy Servant Jesus, whom 
thou didst anoint, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and 
the peoples of Israel, were gathered together." 44 

So far, three Evangelists witness separately, and all the 
apostles witness together in prayer. Luke's statement is very 
remarkable for the web of circumstances which he weaves to- 
gether in one brief paragraph, to authenticate historically the 
beginning of John's ministry. Seven officers are named; 
each one is mentioned as a ruler of a given country; each 
country is designated correctly respecting its ruler, — the Ko- 
mans in relation to their territories ; the high priests in rela- 
tion to their people. This extraordinary mention of concurring 
governments, all brought to view in one sentence to establish 
a single circumstance, is calculated to emphasize the fact con- 
veyed as very important. Every particular brought forward 
exposes the Evangelist to a critical testing respecting its 
historical character , and if one should be found to be untrue, 
that fact would certainly impeach his record so far, and raise 
a presumption against the other particulars as questionable. 
Now, it should be accentuated that no writer would adven- 
ture to give all these details unless he knew them to be his- 

« Luke iii, 1, 2. « Matt, xxvii, 1 ; Mark xv, 1. « Acts iv, 27. 



428 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

torical and that they would bear a critical examination by his 
contemporaries, and certainly no mythical or legendary writer 
could serve his purpose by descending to many details to 
substantiate a single fact by citing many ; for that is the very 
opposite of the mythical spirit. It greatly accentuates the 
character of Luke as a critical historian that not one of these 
particulars has ever been questioned by a reputable writer, 
ancient or modern. 

Among these particularizations it is stated that "Pontius 
Pilate was governor of Judaea" at the very time when John 
began his ministry. Matthew also makes reference to "Pon- 
tius Pilate the governor;" and Mark does not mention the 
office as such, but assumes its existence as understood, and 
then proceeds to relate many remarkable acts which the pro- 
curator performed as an officer of the Romans. When the 
apostles were dismissed from trial before the Sanhedrin, they 
met and reported to the other Christians all that had occurred ; 
and then they voiced in prayer to God the fact, but connected 
the name "Herod" Antipas with that of "Pontius Pilate," of 
having something in common in the procedure against Jesus 
prior to his crucifixion. 

Pilate's procuratorship is abundantly corroborated by both 
classic and Jewish historians. An appeal to the writers of the 
first and second century will be satisfactory. Tacitus records 
in a single sentence that which is conclusive on this point. It 
should be noted that he designates the several historical cir- 
cumstances of time, place, and persons associated with two 
facts of paramount importance in this investigation; and all 
are related to the administration of Pilate, exactly as repre- 
sented by the several Evangelists. He says : 

" Christ, the Founder of this name [Christians], was put to death as 
a criminal by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judaea, in the reign of Tibe- 
rius/' ^ Josephus records that Tiberius "sent in" as procurator of 
Judaea, " Gratus and his successor in the government, Pilate." * "When 

45 Annals, xv, 44. ^Ant. lib. xviii, c. 6, $5. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 429 

Gratus had done these things he went back to Rome, after he had tar- 
ried in Judaea eleven years, when Pontius Pilate came as his suc- 
cessor. " 47 "But now Pilate, the procurator of Judaea, removed the 
army from Csesarea to Jerusalem." 48 

Here are two historians of reputation — the one a heathen 
residing at Rome, the other a Jew dwelling in Palestine, con- 
temporaries of each other, mutually confirming themselves, as 
well as the Evangelists, on the historicity of the statement 
that Pontius Pilate was procurator of Judaea in the reign of 
Tiberius Caesar. 

§ 293. 2. Prominent Occurrences under Pilate's Ruling as Narrated in the 
Gospels. 

The points to be accentuated in the Evangelistic narrative 
are these : 

a) The presence of the procurator at Jerusalem on the occasion of 
the Jews' great feast-days, and the special reason therefor. 

b) The importance of the " tessellated pavement/' incidentally men- 
tioned, and its importance in the Roman administration of justice. 

c) The presence of Pilate's wife at Jerusalem, at the trial of Jesus, 
contrary to the earlier requirements of the empire. 

It was the established custom of the procurator of Judaea, 
whose headquarters were regularly at Csesarea, to go up to 
Jerusalem to the high festivals of the Jews in order to prevent 
any disorder or tumult among the people. It is an unseemly 
reflection on the Jews that it was requisite for heathen rulers 
to keep the peace when the Jews assembled together to ob- 
serve their own great annual and religious feasts. Josephus 
relates how a gang of ruffians known as the sic&rii, so called 
from the daggers which they carried on their persons, were 
accustomed on those occasions to carry on assassination and 
plunder "in the midst of the city; this they did chiefly at the 
festivals when they mingled among the multitude, and con- 
cealed daggers under their garments with which they stabbed 
those who were their enemies." 49 

« Ant. xviii, 2. 2. « 1 b. xviii, 3, 1. 

«Comp. Ant. xx, 5, 3; xx, 9,3; xx, 8, 5, 6; Wars, ii, 12, 1; ii, 13, 3. 



430 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

It was in accordance with this purpose to exercise author- 
ity, if there should be occasion, that Pilate was present at the 
Jews' passover at Jerusalem at the time when Jesus was cruci- 
fied. For his official residence on these occasions, he took the 
palace of Herod the Great. To the courts of this royal resi- 
dence the officers of the Jews conducted the Savior, after they 
had formally denounced him for blasphemy; but their cere- 
monial scrupulousness about defiling themselves as Jews ex- 
cluded them from entrance into the palace to Pilate's presence, 
lest they should prohibit themselves from eating the passover. 

"They lead Jesus therefore from Caiaphas into the palace [prseto- 
rium] ; and it was early in the morning, and they entered not into the 
palace that they might not be defiled, but might eat the passover. 
Pilate therefore went out to them." 60 

When the trial of Jesus had reached its crisis, Pilate pro- 
posed to execute Barabbas, and release Jesus. To receive 
their response to the proposal in a judicial manner, Pilate as- 
cended the Bema, which was a tribunal erected before the 
palace, on an elevated piece of ground covered with a tessellated 
pavement. John relates that " when Pilate heard these words, 
he brought Jesus out, and sat down on the judgment seat at 
a place called the Pavement, but in the Hebrew Gabbatha." 51 

Now, the importance of the tessellated pavement in judicial 
procedures is remarked by both Koman and Jewish authorities. 
Suetonius mentions an instance in point in the case of Julius 
Caesar, who " carried about in his expeditions tessellated and 
marble slabs for the floor of his tent." 52 And also Josephus 
mentions this usage in connection with Herod Philip the te- 
trarch, as follows : 

" His tribunal on which he sat in judgment followed him on his prog- 
ress ; and when any one met him who wanted his assistance, he made 
no delay j but had his tribunal set down immediately wheresoever he 
happened to be, and sat down upon it, and heard his complaint ; he then 
ordered the guilty that were convicted to be punished, and absolved 
those that had been accused unjustly." 53 

w John xviii, 28, 29. 51 J6. xix, 13. &*Jul. Cces. 16. ™Ant. xviii, 4, 6. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 431 

Accordingly Matthew, referring to the occasion of Christ's 
trial narrates that Pilate — 

" While he was sitting on the judgment-seat, his wife* sent unto him 
saying, Have thou nothing to do with that righteous Man, for I have 
suffered many things this day in a dream because of him." 54 

According to Seneca, in the earlier period of the empire, 
Augustus 55 was very strenuous in his policy requiring that 
magistrates, going to imperial provinces to govern, should not 
be accompanied by their wives — only allowing rare exceptions. 
In his biography of Augustus, Suetonius confirms the state- 
ment, restricting the exceptions to very peculiar circumstances. 
Yet as Tacitus writes, " How often did the deified Augustus 
[himself] travel to the east, how often to the west, accompa- 
nied by Livia!" 56 Nevertheless, Germanicus in Germany felt 
constrained to send away his own wife, that she might not 
"be exposed among the soldiers, infuriated and violators of 
everything held sacred by man." Of this fact, Tacitus sym- 
pathetically remarks : " The wife of a great commander com- 
pelled to be a fugitive, and bearing an infant son in her 
bosom!" 57 

Tacitus also relates that in the time of Tiberius, and in the 
year 21, one Cascina Severus moved in the Roman Senate that 
" No magistrate should go into any province accompanied by 
his wife." ffl But his proposition was promptly met with elo- 
quence and urgent opposition, and was rejected finally with no 
little indignation. This disposition of the question settled the 
future policy of the government on that point, so that within 
five years Pilate is found to have entered upon office in Judasa 
accompanied by his wife, as Matthew states without explana- 
tion. It thus appears how that, on the occasion of our Lord's 
trial before the procurator a few years later, Pilate's wife 
sent her husband the strange and startling message : " Have 

* Pilate's wife's name was Clauda Procula (Necepha, Eccl. i, 30). 

f* Matt, xxvii, 19. B5 Be Controv . 25. 

** Annals, Hi, 33,34. ^Ib. i, 40. 5875.111,33. 

28 



432 Historical Evidence of the Xew Testament. 

thou nothing to do with that righteous Man !" This incident, 
of so exceptional a character, interwoven with the narrative of 
Matthew, without mentioning any circumstance leading up to 
the incident, without explanation why Pilate's wife was with 
him at Jerusalem, conveys the implication that the changed 
law was perfectly understood at the time, and incidentally 
attests the correctness and fidelity of the Evangelist's historical 
record. 

§ 294. 3. The Discovery of Pilate's Character Accordant with Sacred and 
Secular History. 

1. The first instance illustrative of the procurator's charac- 
ter for violence and vacillation was evidenced in his interview 
when Jesus stood before his tribunal a silent prisoner, charged 
with high crimes in an indictment by the Jews. Pilate ques- 
tioned Jesus respecting his origin and his claims as King. It 
is stated that 

"He entered into the palace again, and saith unto Jesus, Whence art 
thou? But Jesus gave him no answer. Pilate therefore said unto Him : 
Speakest thou not unto me? Knowest thou not that I have power to 
release thee, and have power to crucify thee? Jesus answered him : Thou 
wouldst have no power against me except it were given thee from above ; 
therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin. Upon 
this Pilate sought to release him." "When Pilate saw that he prevailed 
nothing, but rather that a tumult was arising, he took water and washed 
his hands before the multitude, saying: I am innocent of the blood of 
this Just Person ; see ye to it. . . . But he scourged Jesus, and de- 
livered him to be crucified !" 59 

On another occasion, when Pilate undertook to force upon 
the unwilling Jews the ensigns of Caesar, he evinced the same 
unworthy characteristics. Josephus records of him : 

"Now Pilate, who was sent as procurator into Judaea by Tiberius, 
sent by night those images of Caesar which are called ensigns into Jeru- 
salem," which occasioned "very great tumult among the Jews" and loud 
protests "to preserve to them their ancient laws inviolable." "On the 
next day Pilate sat on his tribunal in the open market-place, and called 
to him the multitude as desiring to give them an answer ; and then gave 
a signal to the soldiers ... to encompass the Jews with their 

59 John xix, 8-12; Matt, xxvii, 24, 25. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 433 

weapons ; so the band of soldiers stood round about the Jews three ranks 
[deep.]" "Pilate also said to them that they should be cut to pieces 
unless they would admit Csesar's images, and gave intimation to the 
soldiers to draw their naked swords." But the Jews, casting themselves 
upon the ground, "exposed their necks bare, and cried out that they 
were sooner ready to be slain than that their law should be trans- 
gressed." 60 Upon which Pilate was deeply affected with their firm 
resolution to keep their laws inviolable, and presently commanded the 
images to be carried back from Jerusalem to Caesarea. 61 

Here at one moment is the threat of instant death, and in 
the next the offensive order is conntermanded, illustrating that 
contradiction of character which always accompanies a base 
and weak mind — making such an issue with the Jews touching 
their religion, and when absolutely resisted unto death, order- 
ing the detested images back to Csesarea. Yiolence and vacil- 
lation in the presence of high moral courage are the evidence 
of a moral coward. And these characteristics were evidenced 
when Pilate, in the presence of the multitude, meekly washed 
his hands in attestation of Christ's innocency which he had 
protested again and again, but immediately countermanded. 

2. A second illustration of Pilate's character relates to 
the occasion of enmity, and then amity, between himself and 
Herod Antipas. Luke relates : 

" Now there were some present at that very season who told him of 
the Galileans whose blood Pilate mingled with their sacrifices." "And 
Herod and Pilate became friends with each other on that very day ; for 
before they were at enmity between themselves." 62 

The peculiarity of these two passages of Scripture is, that 
both purport to be narratives of historical facts; that both 
stand detached from any other written history; that both 
were written by the same writer ; and that both are recorded 
in a manner which indicates the facts related were well known 
and unquestioned in the community where they are said to 
have occurred. Circumstantial evidence is strongly corrobo- 
rative of these citations from Luke. Josephus states that "after 

so Wars, ii, 9, 2, 3. 6l Ant. xviii, 3, 1. «2 Luke xiii, 1 ; xxiii, 12. 



434 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

this, Pilate raised another disturbance by expending that sa- 
cred treasury which is called Corban upon aqueducts. . . . 
At this the multitude had great indignation." 63 A strong 
feeling of resentment arose, which Pilate sought to repress in 
his own dark way, as he was wont. Soldiers clad in the gar- 
ments of men in private life were armed with concealed weap- 
ons in their garments, and mingled with the multitude. He, 
himself, gave the signal, when the soldiers fell upon the people 
indiscriminately, cruelly causing many deaths, 

"And equally punished those that were tumultuous and those that 
were not." "Now, the Jews were so sorely beaten that many of them 
perished by the stripes they received ; and many of them perished as 
trodden to death by themselves, by which means the multitude was 
astonished at the calamity of those that were slain." 64 

On another occasion Pilate, without any apparent provoca- 
tion, ordered his soldiers to fall on the Samaritans. 

"And when they came to an action, some of them they slew, and 
others of them they put to flight, and took a great many alive ; the 
principal [men] of whom, and also the most potent of those that fled 
away, Pilate ordered to be slain." "The Samaritan Senate sent an 
embassy to Vitellius, . . . president of Syria, and accused Pilate of 
the murder of those that were killed. . . . So Vitellius sent Marcel - 
lus, a friend of his, to take care of the affairs of Judsea, and ordered 
Pilate to go to Rome to answer before the emperor to the accusation of 
the Jews; . . . but before he could get to Rome, Tiberius was 
dead." 65 

A case in strong resemblance to the procedure of Pilate 
against the Galileans occurred under the rule of the ethnarch 
Herod Archelaus, who dreaded the influence of "Judas and 
Matthias, those teachers of the law," upon the multitude assem- 
bling for the keeping of the Passover : 

" Lest some terrible thing should spring up by means of these men's 
madness, [he] sent a regiment of armed men, and with them a captain 
of a thousand, to suppress the violent efforts of the seditious, before the 
whole multitude should be infected with like madness." 



•3 Wars, ii, 9, 4. «* Ant. xviii, 3, 2 ; Wars, ii, 9, 4. 65 Ant. xviii, 4, 1, 2, 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 435 

The Jews, however, assaulted the soldiers so that the cap- 
tain and many of the soldiers fled, and when they " had done 
thus, they returned to the sacrifices which were already in 
their hands." Thereupon Archelaus sent the whole army 
upon them and "slew three thousand men." 66 

While there is absolutely nothing recorded in opposition to 
Luke's record of the report made by others to Jesus that Pilate 
had mingled the blood of the Galileans with their sacrifices, 
there is much to credit the statement by indirection. If there 
is not identity in the facts as narrated in sacred history, there 
is circumstantiality enough to justify the belief that Pilate 
was capable of just such a deed, in that his character is en- 
tirely accordant with the representations made. The follow- 
ing conclusions may therefore be legitimately considered : 

1. That the Jews generally, and the Galileans particularly, 
were restive and tumultuous toward the Roman procurators, 
especially on the great festival occasions, due probably, in a 
large measure, to the cruel injustice which they had suffered 
at their hands, but particularly from the outrages committed 
against their religion by these political and heathen rulers. 

2. That in at least one other instance under Archelaus, the 
Jews left their own altars and worship and drove away the 
soldiers, "when they returned to the sacrifices which were 
already in their hands." This clears the way and creates a 
measure of probability in favor of Luke's record of the report 
as authentic, inasmuch as the same affair would be attempted 
again, even though unsuccessfully, as in the case of those 
" Galileans whose blood Pilate mingled with their sacrifices." 
Pilate was not afraid to shed the blood of his subjects, pro- 
vided he could make it appear at Rome that he was suppress- 
ing an uprising of the people. 

3. Those Galileans were not the subjects of Pontius Pilate, 
procurator of Judaea, but of Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Gal- 
ilee. Accordingly, any violence and slaughter of Herod's 

™Ant. xvii, 9, 3; Wars, ii, 2, 5. 



436 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

subjects could not but be regarded as a high-handed outrage 
committed upon his people, but also was a deep affront offered 
to his government. Herod's principality was much inferior 
to Pilate's province in extent, in resource, and in population; 
and as recourse to war was not allowable without the imperial 
consent, and as Pilate had robbed Herod's subjects of their 
share in the sacred votive fund called Cor ban, which he had 
wrongfully appropriated to the public works at Jerusalem, 
these were just the kind of procedures most likely to engender 
" enmity" between these two neighboring rulers of the Jews. 
4. But if there was occasion for enmity between them, 
there was also an occasion for amity. Now, it happened that 
Herod was at the passover at Jerusalem when Jesus was ac- 
cused by the Jews before Pilate. When, then, Pilate had 
learned that Jesus belonged to that tetrarchy, he at once sent 
Christ to Herod as the proper judge of the case. This act in 
the procurator was doubly pleasing to Herod : (1) Because the 
action was an open acknowledgment of the principle that 
Herod's subjects were subject to Herod for their conduct, and 
not to Pilate ; and (2) Because the sending of such a personage 
as Jesus to his presence, was extremely gratifying in itself, 
since, 

" When Herod saw Jesus, he was exceedingly glad ; for he was de- 
sirous to see him for a long time ; and he hoped to see some miracle 
done by him." "And Herod and Pilate became friends with each other 
that very day ; for before they were at enmity between themselves." 67 

§ 295. II. Antonius Claudius Felix. 

This man was not the second procurator of Juasea, out he 
is the second one mentioned in the Evangelistic history. And 
he is properly placed in the order of the "governors" of that 
country. He is named Antonius Felix by Tacitus, and is 
named Claudius by Suidas, but is mentioned simply as Felix 
both by Luke and Josephus. Originally, Felix was a slave of 
Antonia, the daughter of Antony and Cleopatra, and the 

w Luke xxlii, 8, 12. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 437 

mother of Emperor Claudius. He assumed the name Antonius 
because he was the slave of Antonia, as he was afterwards of 
her son Claudius. Subsequently the emperor manumitted 
both Felix and his brother Pallas, both of whom became at- 
tached closely to the person of the emperor, became his chief 
advisers, and in fact, in a large sense, controlled the action of 
the feeble-minded chief during his reign.* 

As procurator of the Jews, Felix occupies a conspicuous 
place in three chapters of the Acts of the Apostles. But in 
every case his name is mentioned incidentally in 

• -ii • * -n. -n i §296. Histor- 

connection with the narrative ot Pauls work icity of Felix's 
and sufferings, which Luke therein has made the Pr °curatorshi P . 
special subjects of his discourse. The first occurrence is in the 
order issued by Claudius Lysias, the military commandant of 
the castle Antonia at Jerusalem, which overlooked the temple 
and its courts. This order provides that the soldiers under 
him shall "bring him [the apostle] safe unto Felix the gov. 
ernor," whose residence was at Caesarea-on-the-Sea ; and he 
wrote a letter after this form : " Claudius Lysias unto the most 
excellent governor Felix, greeting." w 

Both the fact and the time of Felix's appointment as pro- 
curator of Judaea are circumstances well attested by various 
independent witnesses, who are even more explicit in statement 
than was Luke. It should be noticed, however, that Felix was 
twice appointed to this office in different parts of Palestine; 
once when he ruled conjointly with Cumanus in the govern, 
ment of Galilee, Samaria, and Peraea ; and once when he had 
exclusive jurisdiction over Judaea. This will be clearly veri- 
fied by the following testimonies: 

Tacitus remarks: "Felix too, meanwhile, by applying unseasonable 
remedies, inflamed the disaffection, emulated as he was in his aban- 

* Suetonius says: "Among his freedmen, ... if not equal in favor, was 
Felix, . . . being entirely governed by these freedmen." {Claud. 28, 29.) Tac- 
itus adds: "The Jewish kings being either dead, or their dominion reduced to 
narrow limits, he [Claudius] committed the province of Judaea to Roman knights 
or to his freedmen. One of these, Antonius Felix, wielded the scepter of a king 
with the soul of a slave." (Hist, v, 9.) 

es Acts xxiii, 24-26. 



438 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

doned courses by Ventidius Cumanus, who held part of the province ; 
the division being such that Galilee was subject to Cumanus, and Sama- 
ria to Felix." 69 Josephus says: "After this, Caesar sent Felix, the 
brother of Pallas, to be procurator of Galilee and Samaria and Persea." 70 
As respects the procuratorship in Judaea, Josephus adds: " Claudius 
sent Felix, the brother of Pallas, to take care of the affairs of Judaea." 71 
And Tacitus says: " Felix, for some time governor of Judaea, acted not 
with . . . moderation, but relying upon such powerful protection 
[as that of Pallas] supposed that he might perpetrate with impunity 
every kind of villainy." 72 

In addition to these historical attestations, there exists an 
§ 297. evidence incontestable in a coin struck under the 
Evidence, authority of Felix, which is thus described : 

"Obverse: a palm branch with the legend, 'Of Caesar,' in the year 5 ; 
[i. e.] in the fifth year of Nero's reign [Claudius's successorl, and there- 
fore struck by Felix [ himself] sometime between the 13th of October, 
A. D. 53, and the 13th of October, A. D. 59. Reverse: the legend, 
Nepwvos, 'Of Nero,' within a wreath." 73 

Thomas Lewin, Esq., in his famous work on Paul, says : 

"Felix was certainly appointed in A. D. 52, and it is equally clear 
that Albinus arrived in the province as successor to Festus in A. D. 62. 
The portion, therefore, of this interval of ten years not occupied by 
Festus will represent the procuratorship of Felix. The events in the 
time of Festus were few, and would not require so much as two years. 
Festus died at the close of A. D. 61, and as prefects left Rome for the 
provinces on the 15th of April, the arrival of Festus in Judaea as suc- 
cessor to Felix may be placed about midsummer A. D. 60. Thus the 
procuratorship of Felix lasted from A. D. 52 to 60, a period of eight years, 
a tenure of office unusually long." 74 

If, now, there be added to this period that in which Felix 
was procurator in Samaria, there is ample vindication of the 
truth in Paul's courteous remark : " Forasmuch as I know thou 
hast been of many years a judge unto this nation, I do cheer- 
fully make my defense." 75 

The material points substantiated by these evidences are 
these : That Felix was appointed procurator of Judaea as a 
matter of historical fact. This is shown by the testimony of 

69 Annals, xii, 54. ™ Wars, ii, 12, 8. " Ant. xx, 7, 1. « Ann. xii, 54. 

*3 Lewin, Life and Epis. of Paul, Vol. II, p. 121. 74 j . n, p . 170, note 117, 

76 Acts xxiv, 10. 



Roman Ruleks of the Jews in New Testament. 439 

both Tacitus and Josephus, from both the Roman and Jewish 
side of history; also that he ruled Judaea from the years 52 
to 60, as demonstrated by the coin struck by Felix during his 
procuratorship in Judaea, in the reign of Nero. The two pro- 
curatorships of Felix over the Jews more than justify the re- 
mark of the apostle — that Felix had been ruler of that 
"nation" for "many years" in the comparative and natural 
sense, since the usual period for the exercise of such authority 
had been but two or three years. 

The Unknown Egyptian Impostor. 
An incident of very considerable importance occurred unaer 
the administration of Felix, which connects this procurator 
with the Apostle Paul in the account of the New „ nn 

r § 298. The 

Testament. While Paul was engaged in his spir- unnamed 

itual devotions in the courts of the temple during 

his last visit to Jerusalem, he was seized and beaten by some 

of his Jewish brethren, but rescued by the Roman soldiery 

garrisoned at the castle Antonia, at the extreme northwest 

grounds of the temple. When the soldiers brought Paul into 

the castle, the chief captain said : 

"Dost thou know Greek? Art thou not, then, the Egyptian who 
before these days stirred up to sedition and led out into the wilderness 
the four thousand men of the assassins? But Paul said: I am a Jew of 
Tarsus in Cilicia, a citizen of no mean city." 76 

The particular point to be observed is not Paul's personal 
experience, but the inquiry of the chief captain Lysias as to a 
nameless impostor who figured as a prophet, called " the Egyp- 
tian," whom Paul was supposed to be. That there was in fact 
such a character, who brought disaster upon a multitude of 
Jews, is made evident by secular and contemporary history. 
Josephus describes the man and his procedures with much 
circumstantiality in his different works. He says : 

"There came out of Egypt about this time to Jerusalem one who 
said that he was a prophet, and advised the multitude of the common 

< 6 Acts xxi, 37, 39. 



440 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

people to go along with him to the Mount of Olives, . . . that from 
thence he would show them how at his command the walls of Jerusalem 
should fall down ; and he promised them that he would procure them an 
entrance into the city through those walls when they were fallen down/' 
Felix "ordered his soldiers to take weapons, and he came against them 
with a great number of horse and footmen. . . . He slew four 
hundred of them, and took two hundred alive. But the Egyptian him- 
self escaped." 77 

In another history Josephus mentions this occurrence, 
adding merely that " the Egyptian fled, followed by only a 
few," and that " the greatest number of those that were with 
him were either slain or taken prisoners." ^ 

1. The first thing to be noticed is, that the incident of the 
adventure of the Egyptian impostor referred to by Luke is 

„, „_. historical. It is interesting, if not remarkable, 

§299. The . . 

case is that both the chief captain and Josephus identify 
the notable false prophet as " an Egyptian." Jo- 
sephus mentions him as "the Egyptian false prophet" who 
"came out of Egypt;" that others joined "with the Egyptian" 
in the "sedition," and that at the close of the battle "the 
Egyptian escaped." Lysias, the chief captain, also said: "Art 
thou, then, not the Egyptian? " Naturally he supposed that he 
had at last the escaped criminal in custody in the person of 
Paul, as he could not readily understand why the Jews other- 
wise should raise a tumult in their own temple grounds in 
the midst of sacrificial services, and assault one of their own 
brethren in that murderous way. But he soon discovered 
his mistake. Nevertheless, the coincidence of language by 
Josephus and the chief captain designating the place of the 
false prophet's nativity, is precisely that kind of language to 
be looked for as determinative of any case as historical. 

2. It is contended, however, that Josephus and Luke are at 

variance as to the numbers led off in this sedition 

§ 300. Discrep- 
ancy Between by the Egyptian. Josephus records that three 

thousand were led out into the wilderness, while 

Luke records " four thousand." A discrepancy in the estimate 

■"Ant. xx, 8, 6. 78 Wars, ii, 13, 5. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 441 

of the numbers does not vacate the fact. But it is to be noted 
carefully that it is not at all Luke's estimate, but that of Zysias, 
the chief captain ; and the only responsibility of Luke involved 
is that of recording faithfully just what Lysias said in the 
premises. The discrepancy is exclusively between Josephus 
and the chief captain, and Luke's record remains unimpeached. 

Paul and Roman Citizenship. 

As matters now progressed, the chief captain proposed to 

know who the prisoner was, and prepared to 

r J r r §301. The 

make examination by exposing the person of the Rights of 
apostle to the torture of the rods, when Paul Cltlzensm P- 
appealed to his rights as a Roman citizen under the law. The 
record is that— 

" When they had tied him up with thongs, Paul said unto the centu- 
rion that stood by, Is it lawful for you to scourge a man that is a 
Roman and uncondemned? . . . And the chief captain came and 
said unto him, Tell me, art thou a Roman? And he said, Yea. And 
the chief captain said, With a great sum obtained I this citizenship. 
And Paul said, But I am a Roman born. They then who were about 
to examine him [by scourging] straightway departed from him ; and the 
chief captain also was afraid when he knew he was a Roman, and be- 
cause he had bound him." 79 

The right of Roman citizenship involved personal freedom. 
It was in itself a proud claim of character entitling one to 
the consideration due to high dignity and position in society. 
It afforded immunity from burdens of the government, and 
conveyed claims which were sacredly secured and protected 
by law. Among other privileges, a citizen enjoyed full 
rights of property and control over his children and depend- 
ents; he had a voice in the assemblies of the people, and in 
the election of magistrates, and after his death his will was 
sacredly authoritative to dispose of property. For crime he 
was liable on condemnation to be beheaded ; but he was ex- 
empt by law from bonds and imprisonment, from scourging 
and crucifixion. These punishments were reserved for slaves 

^Actsxxii, 25-29. 



442 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

and criminals, but were held to be too inhuman and ignoble 
to be inflicted upon a Eoman citizen. It was a grave crime to 
impose such punishment upon a "Roman," and it is said that 
any magistrate doing so, rendered himself liable to the same 
penalty. This explains the fear of the officers in charge of 
the apostle both at Philippi and at Jerusalem, where his claim 
of citizenship was made and respected. The mere declaration, 
"I am a Eoman citizen" was deemed sufficient, and if falsely 
claimed, rendered the claimant liable to death. But exemp- 
tion on this plea was available only in the presence of a 
Roman magistrate, and was not available before a Jewish 
authority. Hence the apostle says: "Of the Jews five times 
received I forty stripes save one." 80 At a Roman tribunal, a 
citizen was entitled to a trial by legal process ; and the right 
of appeal from a provincial magistrate's decision to the Em- 
peror of Rome was an inviolable right of a Roman citizen 
under the law. 

The Valerian law (B. C. 508) disallowed strictly the bind- 
ing of a Roman citizen; and the Porcian law (B. C. 300) for- 
bade the citizen being beaten with rods. Cicero, 

§ 302. Citizen- : . . & . > 

ship and in his Oration against Verres, speaks with much 
pride of the high claim and its lawful pro- 
tection and immunities. He says : 

" That exclamation, ' I am a Roman citizen,' which often has brought 
assistance and safety among barbarians in the remotest parts of the 
earth." 81 "Whosoever he might be whom thou wert hurrying to the 
rack, were he even unknown to thee, if he said that he was a ' Roman 
citizen.' he would necessarily obtain from thee, the praetor, by the sim- 
ple mention of Rome, if not escape, yet at least a delay in punishment." 82 
With great indignation he says: "A Roman citizen was publicly beaten 
with rods in the Forum of Messina ; during this public dishonor, no 
groan, no expression of the unhappy wretch was heard amid the cruel- 
ties he suffered and the sound of the strokes which were inflicted, but 
this: 'I am a Roman citizen.' ,,8S 

"The Porcian law removes the whips from the body of all Roman 
citizens." " The Porcian law takes away the liberty of a Roman citizen 

so 2 Cor. xi, 24. 81 Orat. pro Verrem. lib. v. c. 57. 

82 lb. Act. ii, 1. v, cc. 64, 65. ^Against Verves. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 443 

from the hand of the lictor." 84 "It is a violation of the law that a 
citizen be bound; it is a crime that he be scourged." "The cause 
being heard, many can be absolved; but unheard 85 no man can be 
condemned." 

In view of these noble principles of Roman judicature, 
then so well established and so generally understood, it was 
unquestionably" a matter of painful surprise and alarm to the 
chief captain when he discovered that the prisoner in his cus- 
tody, whom he should have protected by the shield of the law, 
was a Roman citizen, whom he had ordered tied up with two 
thongs to the whipping post with the purpose of scourging 
him as a criminal slave ! A better insight into the embarrass- 
ing situation of Lysias in the castle of Antonia can hardly be 
furnished by written history. The very naturalness of the 
narrative is so impressive as to convey to the mind the con- 
viction of its truth. 

Claudius Lysias affirms that he had purchased his citizen- 
ship "with a great sum." Was this transaction accordant 
with the history of the times ? Tacitus men- a nnr> „. . 

J § 303. Citizen- 

tions that in the times of Claudius (41-54), ship. How 
" The census of citizenship [in the entire empire] 
was five millions, nine hundred and eighty-four thousand and 
seventy-two." m Now, it is historical that, during the period 
of the empire, citizenship was conferred very freely and 
readily, and even capriciously; sometimes for a price, some- 
times for a service, sometimes for merit. In some cases it was 
bestowed as a favor upon individuals; in others upon cities 
and even a whole province! Suetonius relates how that 
Augustus deprived some cities in alliance with Rome of their 
freedom, and rebuilt others which had been destroyed by 
earthquakes, or were deeply in debt. 87 

" To those who could produce any instance of their having deserved 
well of the Roman people, he presented with the freedom of the Lat- 
ium, or even that of the City [Rome]." Philo represents Agrippa I 

w Orat. pro Rabiro. ®>Verrem, v, 66, Orat. 5. 86 Annals, xi, 25. 

87 Augustus, 47. 



444 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

as saying to Caligula his friend: "You have enabled whole countries 
to which your friends belong to be citizens of Eome." 88 Suetonius 
mentions that Nero had " the Pyrrhic dance performed by certain youths, 
to each of whom, after the performance was over, he granted the free- 
dom of Rome/' 89 Dion Cassius states that Antony " collected money 
from private individuals, selling to some the right of citizenship, and 
to others exemption from taxes." "After this Claudius . . . took 
away the liberty of the City from many who were worthy of it, and, 
without any reason, gave it to others ; sometimes to single individuals ; 
at other times to a great number collectively. For the Romans, so to 
speak, having the preference over strangers, there were many who 
begged the citizenship of the emperor, and others who bought it of 
Messalina or of Csesar's friends. On account of this, the privilege which 
formerly had been purchased at a great price, thereupon was rendered 
cheap by this reckless accommodation ; so that even the story was 
invented that albeit, if a man should give to one as compensation pieces 
of shattered glass, he shall become a citizen." 90 

These historical references and citations amply confirm the 
statement of Lysias in claiming to have purchased his citizen- 
ship at a great price; and of Luke, who, in recording the 
claim, wrote in accordance with the spirit of the times. 

A different but a very material point touching 

§ 304. Citizsn- 

ship and the historicity of Luke's record is the case and 
claim of the apostle to being a Koman citizen by 
heredity: "But I am a Eoman born." Facts shall speak for 
themselves. 

Appian says: " Mark Antony gave liberty and immunity from taxes 
to Laodicea and Tarsus, and by special edict ordered that all citizens of 
Tarsus who had been captured and sold for slaves should be manu- 
mitted." 91 Lucian mentions " that on the request of Athenodorus, a 
Stoic philosopher of Tarsus, and teacher of Augustus, the city was freed 
from tribute;" 92 and Pliny adds "that Tarsus was a free city." 93 
Conybeare and Howson say: "We have good reason to believe that 
at the period of the apostle's birth, the Jews were unmolested at 
Tarsus, where his father lived and enjoyed the rights of a Roman 
citizen. It is a mistake to suppose that this citizenship was a privi- 
lege which belonged to the members of the family, as being natives 
of this city. Tarsus was not a municipium, nor was it a colonia, like 
Philippi in Macedonia, or Antioch in Pisidia ; but it was a free city 
(urbs libera) like the Syrian Antioch and its neighbor city, Seleucia- 

88 Be Virtue, ii, 578. 89 Nero, 12. » Hist. Rom. lx, 17. 

n-Appian de Bell. Civ. v. « Works, Vol. II, 473. 93 Pliny, lib. v. 27. 



Rom ax Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 445 

on-the-Sea. Such a city had the privilege of being governed by its 
own magistrates, and was exempt from the occupation of a Roman 
garrison; but its citizens did not necessarily possess the civitas of 
Rome. . . The family of St. Paul were in the same position at Tar- 
sus as those who were Jews of Asia Minor, and yet citizens of Rome at 
Ephesus." 94 

"Rawlinson observes: " Citizenship by birth on the part of a for- 
eigner might arise (1) From his being a native of some colony or mu- 
nicipium ; (2) From a grant of citizenship, on account of service rendered 
to his father or a more remote ancestor ; or (3) From his father or more 
remote ancestor having purchased his freedom." 95 W. L. Bevan says: 
"The right once obtained, descended to a man's children." 96 T. J. 
Woolsey adds: "Roman citizenship was most frequently acquired by 
birth ; but for this it was requisite that both father and mother should 
be citizens. If a citizen married a Latina or a Peregrina, the children 
followed the status of the mother." 97 Suetonius says, however, that 
Caligula restricted the privilege of citizenship by heredity to the sons ; 
that the emperor declared that " none had any right to the freedom 
of Rome, although their ancestors had acquired it for themselves and 
their posterity, unless they were sons ; for that none beyond that de- 
gree ought to be considered posterity." 98 

Josephus remarks that the Jews having been highly serviceable in 
Egypt, in the interests of Julius Csesar in opposition to Pompey, Julius 
1 ' honored Antipater very greatly and confirmed Hyrcanus in the high 
priesthood, and bestowed upon Antipater the privilege of a citizen of 
Rome, and freedom from taxes everywhere." 99 "Two of the principal 
Syrians in Csesarea persuaded Burrhus, who was Nero's tutor and secre- 
tary for his Greek Epistle, by giving him a great sum of money, to dis- 
annul the equality of the Jewish privileges of citizens which they had 
hitherto enjoyed." 100 "Lucius Lentulus, the consul, freed the Jews 
that are in Asia from going into the armies, at my intercession for 
them." But the procurator Florus " whipped and nailed to the cross 
before his tribunal those who, although they were by birth Jews, yet 
were they of the Roman dignity, nevertheless." 101 

Arrian says that " those who feigned to be Roman citizens were 
severely punished." 102 Suetonius affirms that Claudius "confiscated 
the estates of all freedmen who [falsely] presumed to take upon them 
the equestrian rank." 103 " Those usurping the freedom of Rome, Clau- 
dius beheaded on the Esquiline " m — a place devoted to the execution 
of the worst criminals at the Capital. 

w Life and Epis. of St. Paul, i, 55, 56, Eng. ed. 

*>Bamp. Lects. 1859, Amer. ed. p. 398, n. 50. Lect. vii. 

^ Smith's Bib. Diet. " Citizenship." * Johnson's Cycl. « Caligula 38. 

*>Ant. xiv. 8, 1-3. 100 i b. xx. 8, 9. ^-Ant. xiv. 10, 13; Wars, ii. 14, 9. 

102 "Qui jus Romanae civitatis mentiuntur, graviter puniuntur" (cited by 
Biscoe). 103 Sueton. Claudius, c. 25. 

104 " Civitatem Romanam usurpantes in campo Esquelino securi percussit." 
{Claudius 25.) 



446 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Thrice at least did the apostle claim for himself the dig- 
nity, the rights, and immunity of a Koman citizen, either 
• outright or by necessary implication. In all 

ship of the instances the claim was respected and acted 
upon. The first claim was made at Philippi ; 
the second at Jerusalem; and the third at Cassarea. At 
Philippi he and Silas together were subjected to the twofold 
indignity of scourging and imprisonment in stocks ; an outrage 
with the added aggravations that this was done to them with- 
out a crime, without inquiry, without a trial, before the open 
public, and upon the demands of an irresponsible and fanatical 
mob. Afterwards, when the authorities would privately rid 
themselves of their prisoners, Paul said to the officer in charge : 

" They have beaten us publicly, uncondemned [by trial and sen- 
tence], men who are Romans, and cast us into prison ; and do they now 
cast us out privily ? Nay, verily ; but let them come themselves and 
bring us out. . . . And they feared when they heard that they were 
Romans ; and they came and besought them . . . and brought them 
out." 105 

The conduct of the magistrate and officers is obviously a 
concession of the legality of the claim to citizenship, as well 
as a confession of the fact that they had been guilty of outrag- 
ing the Roman law, and exposing themselves to the severest 
penalty. "The divine Augustus made a law that torture 
should not be applied " m to a citizen. " But arbitrary power 
often broke over this law, both at Eome and in the prov- 
inces." m The usual order to inflict punishment was terse, 
peremptory, and intensely Koman: " Lictor, seize, strip, 
scourge/" 108 

Now, the interesting question arises: Why did not Paul 
plead at Philippi his citizenship at the first, and save himself 
the suffering and degradation of the scourge, as he did after- 
wards at Jerusalem ? Neither the apostle, nor yet Luke, gives 
a single word of explanation. The reason must be found out- 
side the sacred text. 

106 Acts xvi, 21, 22, 36-39. ^Digest. 48, Tit. 18, $ 1. 

i°f Rawl. Bampt. Lects. p. 399. 108 " Summove, Lictor, despoila, verbera" 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 447 

Biscoe says: "The [Babylonian] Talmud explains this to us. It is 
thence abundantly evident that they [the Jews] were very backward to 
excommunicate the wise [men], the doctors, and the teachers of the law. 
If such committed crimes worthy of excommunication, they scourged 
them, but were unwilling to excommunicate them. . . . Scourging 
left no mark of infamy, nor any diminution of a person's dignity, so that 
the high priest himself was subject to this punishment. . . . Foras- 
much as he [Paul] professed a subjection to the Jewish laws, it was in 
vain for him to plead this privilege [of citizenship]. The Romans 
allowed the Jews to use their own laws. Roman citizens themselves, if 
Jews, were to undergo the penalties prescribed by the Jewish laws." 109 
Dr. Farrar's answer is to the following effect: "To have refused to 
undergo [scourging] by shielding himself under the privilege of Roman 
citizenship, would have been to incur excommunication, and finally to 
have cut himself off from admission into the synagogues." His proffer, 
then, would not have been " first to the Jew, and also to the Gentile." 110 

This answer is perfect when the apostle was in the hands 
of officers who were Jews ; but is not applicable in his case at 
Philippi, or at Jerusalem, or at Csesarea, where the magis- 
trates or officers were Romans. Paul says: "Of the Jews 
received I forty stripes save one." Twice at Jerusalem Paul 
made this claim : " I am a Jew of Tarsus in Cilicia, a citizen 
of no mean city? Afterward again Lysias asked in legal 
form, in reply to which the true answer must come : " Tell me, 
art thou a Roman f" The reply was an unqualified affirma- 
tion, " Yea? In his letter to Felix, Lysias credited the claim 
as proper: "I came with the soldiers and rescued him, having 
learned that he was a Roman." m 

The third instance in which Paul claimed citizenship was 
when, under the accusation of the Jews at Cassarea, Festus 
asked the apostle whether he was willing to go and be tried 
by the Jews at Jerusalem. His manly reply was : 

" I am standing [now] before Caesar's judgment-seat, where I ought 
to be judged. ... If none of these things be true whereof they ac- 
cuse me, no man may give me unto them. / appeal unto Caesar." Then 
Festus answered: "Thou hast appealed unto Csesar; unto Caesar shalt 
thou go." 112 

™Hist. of Acts, 177, 178. 

™IAfe and Work of St. Paul, Vol. I; Excursus, xl, p. 664. i«Acts xxiii, 27. 

w« lb. xxv, 10-12, 21. 
29 



448 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

No one but a citizen was entitled to appeal from a provin- 
cial ruler to the Emperor of Eome ; but to such, the right was 
guaranteed by the Porcian, the Yalerian, and Sempronian 
laws. No officer or magistrate could lawfully refuse to enter- 
tain the appeal ; and after the word had been spoken, neither 
party could withdraw or avert the appeal. The grant is there- 
fore the evidence that the appeal was just, and an official rec- 
ognition of Paul's citizenship. Also King Agrippa II, who 
heard the appeal made and granted, admitted the claim when 
he said : " This man might have been set at liberty, if he had 
not appealed unto Caesar." The appeal was entertained at 
Rome, when the appeal was duly heard. This was the final 
confirmation of the dignity claimed. Suetonius remarks of 
Augustus Caesar: 

''All appeals in causes between inhabitants of Rome he assigned 
every year to the prsetor of the city ; and where provincials were con- 
cerned, to men of consular rank, to one of whom the business of each 
province was referred." 113 

INDUCTIONS. 

These several occurrences, happening under the ruling of 
the respective procurators of Judaea, serve to illustrate the 
internal history of the times, and confirm the statements con- 
cerning them in the historical New Testament. They evidence 
such a perfect acquaintance on the part of the Evangelist with 
the minutiae of these public affairs, that it is difficult to resist 
the conviction that the writer was writing from personal ob- 
servation, and out of the times of these events. The following 
conclusions are therefore legitimated : 

1. That the purchased citizenship for a great price, as 
claimed by Lysias, harmonizes with the facts and spirit of the 
times, as described by the historian Dion Cassius : " This priv- 
ilege had formerly been purchased at a great price." 

2. That it is in evidence that Jews were elevated to the 
dignity of Koman citizenship, not merely on the testimony of 

^Augustus, 33, close. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 449 

Appian that Antony "gave liberty to Tarsus," and on that of 
Pliny that "Tarsus was a free city," but on the witness of 
Josephus that Lycius Lentulus discharged some of the army 
upon discovering that they were "Jews who were Roman citi- 
zens" in Asia; and further, that Florus crucified Jews "who 
were of the Roman dignity." These facts taken together 
warrant a powerful presumption favorable to the belief that 
Paul's ancestry resident at Tarsus were Roman citizens, and 
that Paul came into possession of that dignity by heredity. 

3. That the apostle himself grounds this civic right upon the 
recognized principle of Roman law that he acquired it duly by 
inheritance : " I am a Roman born." That the right of this 
privilege by birth was inalienable in law was virtually con- 
ceded by Caligula, who limited the term "posterity" to the 
sons of citizens exclusively. Though otherwise acquirable, the 
most common method was its transmission by birth. 

4. Paul's own claim of citizenship was not merely infer- 
ential, but it was positively affirmed again and again, and as 
often entertained and conceded. The magistrates at Philippi, 
Lysias at Jerusalem, Festus and Agrippa at Caesarea, the enter- 
tainment of the appeal unto Caesar at Rome, are so many 
proofs that the claim was just and right in law, and in the 
view of the officers of the law having the matter in hand. 

5. That the historical character of Luke's writing is suffi- 
ciently attested. The internal evidence of his writing furnishes 
the best proof of his familiarity with the facts and incidents 
which he records ; yet there is the witness of the several inde- 
pendent historians, writing in different countries, in different 
languages — Greek, Roman, and Jewish historians, who wrote 
near his own time — who powerfully confirm the historicity of 
Luke's record at all points. 

§ 306. III. Porcius Festus. 

a) His Historical Character. A knowledge of the procu- 
rator Festus is scanty. Nothing whatever is known of his 
history prior to his entrance upon his public office in Judaea, 



450 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



where his death occurred before he had completed his second 
year of service. The only two sources of information are the 
writings of Luke and Josephus. These, however, are in accord 
in representing Festus as an historical man, and a just and up- 
right procurator of the Jews in Judeea. In giving a narration 
of Paul, the Evangelist introduces Festus in an incidental 
manner : 

"But when two years [of the apostle's imprisonment at Caesarea] 
were fulfilled, Felix was succeeded by Porcius Festus. . . . Festus 
therefore having come into the province, after three days went up to 
Jerusalem from Caesarea, " etc. 114 

Three historical points are here involved : the identification 
of the person ; the designation of the office ; and his place in 
the succession after Felix. Josephus is equally explicit with 
Luke touching these particulars, but gives this added informa- 
tion, that Festus assumed government in Judaea in the reign 
of Nero. He says: 

"Now when Porcius Festus was sent as successor to Felix by Nero, 
the principal of the inhabitants of Caesarea went up to Rome to accuse 
Felix." 115 " Now it was that Festus succeeded Felix as procurator, and 
made it his business to correct those who made disturbances in the 
country." 116 " Upon Festus's coming into Judaea, it happened that 
Judaea was afflicted with robbers," etc. 117 

It is a noticeable circumstance that, in this brief record of 
the Jewish historian, Luke is confirmed in every point of de- 
tail. It is in order next to consider the principal facts and 
incidents which occurred under the administration of Festus 
with a view to their historicity as mentioned in the New 
Testament. 
fi) Festus's Use of "My Lord. " 

It is objected to Luke's account as inaccurate that he in- 
serts the expression "my lord" as the language of Festus in 
reference to the emperor, and that this expression was not in 
use during this period. The occasion was when Paul at Caes- 
area was brought forth by this procurator and delivered his 

«« Acts xxiv, 27 ; xxv, 1. " 6 Ant. xx, 8, 9. * 16 Wars, ii, 14, 1. 

i" Ant. xx, 8, 10. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 451 

famous address before King Agrippa II and the chieftains and 
dignitaries of the city. In introducing his distinguished pris- 
oner, Festus said: 

" I found that he had committed nothing worthy of death; and as 
he himself appealed to the emperor I determined to send him. Of whom 
I have no certain thing to write unto my Lord." 118 

But it is evident that this title was applied to the emperor 
as early as the time of Augustus, for Suetonius says: 

"He always abhorred the title of lord as ill-omened and offensive. 
And when in a play performed at the theater at which he was present, 
these words were introduced, '0 just and gracious Lord,' 119 and the whole 
company with joyful acclamations testified their approbation of them as 
applied to him, he instantly put a stop to their indecent flattery by wav- 
ing his hand and frowning sternly ; and the next day publicly declared 
his displeasure in a proclamation. He never afterwards would suffer 
himself to be addressed in that manner, even by his own children or 
grandchildren, either in jest or earnest ; and he forbade them the use of 
all such complimentary expressions to one another." 

Suetonius mentions the disapproval by Tiberius, the suc- 
cessor of Augustas, in regard to this title. He says: "Being 
once called 'lord' by some person, he desired that he might 
no more be affronted in that manner." m Tacitus cites an in- 
stance in which he "sharply rebuked such as said 'his divine 
occupations,' and called him 'Lord.'" 121 Now, the fact that 
both these emperors repudiated the title, proves that the title 
had teen used. Josephus also mentions "a sect" of pharisaic 
philosophers whom he represents as saying that — 

"God is to be their only ruler and Lord, . . . nor can any fear 
make them call any man Lord ; and since this immovable resolution of 
theirs is well known, I will speak no furtherlabout the matter." 122 " Now 
Caius Csesar did so grossly abuse the fortune he had arrived at as to 
take himself to be a god." 123 " He also asserted his own divinity, and 
insisted on greater honors to be paid him by his subjects than are due to 
mankind." m 



118 Ti yp&\pcu T<j),ic6piip ovk exw, Acts xxv, 26. 

us " o Dominum aequum et bonum," Augustus, c. 53. lao Tiberius, c. 27. 

i2i Annals, ii, 87; Josephus, Wars, ii, 10, 4. u*Ant. xviii, 1, 6. 

i»Wars, ii, 10, 1, 4. WAnt. xix, 1, 1. 



452 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Philo's companions, delegated to represent the Jews' griev- 
ances to the emperor at Rome, called him "lord." Pliny ad- 
dressed his official letters to Trajan, and Fronto addressed his 
to Marcus Aurelius, with the title "my lord." Dion Cassius 
mentions Nero as appearing clad as an actor in the theater, 
saying: "Do you hear me favorably, my lords." m Domitian 
dictated as the form of letters to be addressed to his procu- 
rators : " Our Lord and G-od commands so and so ; whence it 
came to be the rule, that no one should style him otherwise in 
writing or speaking." m Seneca refers to his own brother " the 
deputy of Achaia," as " my Lord Gallio." m Thomas Lewin 
says : " Caligula was greedy of it [the title] ; and it seems to 
have been assumed by his successors till the reign of Domitian 
[A. D. 81-96], when it was assigned to the emperors by law." 128 

In the presence of such historical evidence, there ought to 
be no question of the Evangelist's accuracy ; a characteristic 
which extends to the minutest detail in his narration. 

§307. IV. Proconsuls. 

The mention of proconsuls in the New Testament is lim- 
ited to the Book of Acts. There are but three instances, 
but each is historically exact. These are (1) " The proconsul 
Sergius Paulus, a man of understanding," m who was converted 
to the Christian faith under the ministry of Paul, during his 
first missionary journey, at Paphos in the island Cyprus, 
where he was resident and the ruler of the island. (2) " When 
Gallio [Seneca's brother] was proconsul of Achaia," 130 who 
refused to entertain a charge brought against Paul, because 
it was merely a matter of the Jews' religion." (3) "The 
courts are open, and there are proconsuls;" 131 a statement 
made by the town clerk at Ephesus, who was registrar of the 
city. 

125 Hist. Rom. 1, lxi, 20. 

W6 Kv/nof and Dominus were equivalents in inscriptions. See President Wool- 
sey's art. " Festus " in Smith's Bib. Diet. 

127 Seneca said of his brother: "Ulud mihi in ore erat Domini mei Gallionis;" 
comp. Epis. 104 with Acts xxv, 26. 128 p au l, ii, 176; note 148. 

>29 Acts xiii, 7. 130 lb. xviii, 12. isi lb. xix, 38. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 453 

"And when they had gone through the whole island unto Paphos, 
they found a certain sorcerer, a false prophet, a Jew 
whose name was Bar- Jesus, who was with the pro- 8 * 
consul Sergius Paulus, a man of understanding. The proconsul. 
same called unto him Barnabas and Saul, and sought 
to hear the word of God/' 132 

Paphos was a city located on the extreme west end of the 
island, Cyprus. The apostles Barnabas and Paul, starting 
from Antioch in Syria, were making together their first mis- 
sionary journey; and this was the second station where 
they stopped in their work. Luke remarks incidentally that 
the ruler Sergius Paulus was a " sagacious " or a " shrewd 
man." 133 In former times scholarly minds found much diffi- 
culty in reconciling the facts with the statement of Luke 
touching Paulus being proconsul at this time ; and even Gro- 
tius came to believe that the Evangelist had erred in designat- 
ing Cyprus as governed by a proconsul by the appointment of 
the Senate, when at the very first Augustus had made it an 
imperial province. Nevertheless, time and investigation have 
developed the exactness of the Evangelist's statement. 

It is true that in the original partition of the provinces, 
Cyprus was imperial ; but Dion Cassius relates that afterwards 
an exchange was effected in which Dalmatia was taken by the 
emperor, and Gallia Narbonensis and Cyprus were transferred 
to the Roman Senate. Thus Cyprus became proconsular, and 
Sergius Paulus became the proconsul. And what lends inter- 
est to the circumstance is the fact that this exchange was 
effected but a few years before Luke wrote the Book of Acts. 
Since the exchange of provinces was thoroughly understood 
by contemporaries, it was not needful that Luke should make 
any explanation. He was not writing to explain the condi- 
tion of the country, but to state known facts concerning it. 

Incontestable evidence of the correctness of this conclusion 
has been discovered in the red copper coins from native mines 
in that region in Citium and Curiam, bearing inscriptions 

132 Acts xiii, 6, 7, 12. ™ lb. xiii, 7, dvdpc <rvveT$ . 



454 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

relating to this very period, ascribing proconsular functions to 

Cominius Proculus, Julius Cordus, and L. Aunus Bassus. Be- 

~~~ ~ * sides, the strict exactness of Luke is conclusively 

§309. Proofs ' J 

from attested by a coin struck under the Emperor 
Claudius, when Cominius Proculus was procon- 
sul, who is understood to have immediately succeeded Sergius 
Paulus in Cyprus. The coin bears on the obverse side an 
image of the head of Claudius, and on the reverse side the 
superscription : 

"Of the Cyprians. Under Cominius Proculus, Proconsul." 134 
This is conclusive proof that Cyprus was proconsular about 
this time. Another inscription of recent discovery exists in 
the Cesnola's Cyprus in these words : 

"In the Rule of Paulus, Proconsul." 135 
This is conclusive proof respecting Sergius Paulus being pro- 
consul of Cyprus. These perpetual evidences, like monuments, 
settle critically and permanently any reasonable doubt as to 
the authentic and authoritative statements of Luke respecting 
Sergius Paulus as proconsul of Cyprus. 

In describing an incident in Paul's ministry Luke states: 

"But when Gallio was proconsul of Achaia, the Jews with 

one accord rose up against Paul and brought 

§310. Gallio r o o 

of him before the judgment seat." 136 To substan- 

tiate the historical character of this proconsul- 
ship is somewhat difficult owing to the numerous changes to 
which it was subjected about this period. Originally, Augus- 
tus assigned it to the Roman Senate, and it was governed by a 
proconsul. His successor, Tiberius, upon the request of the 
people interested, placed Achaia with the emperor, and ruled 
it by a procurator. Tacitus wrote : " The province of Achaia 

MEckhel, iii, 84; Morell's Thes. Numis. lllustr. 39, 42. 

135 Eni IIATAOr [AN0]inATOT. See, further, Bishop Lightfoot in 
Contemporary Review for May 1878, and Essays, p. 294; also Salmon's Introd. to 
the N. T. chap, xviii, pp. 321, 322, note. 

i86Actsxviii, 12. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 455 

and Macedonia praying relief from public burdens, were for 
the present discharged of their proconsular government, 
and transferred to Tiberius." 137 Then in the fourth year of 
his reign Claudius restored the province to the Senate, and it 
was again governed by a proconsul. Suetonius says of Claud- 
ius: "He gave up to the Senate the provinces of Achaia and 
Macedonia which Tiberius had transferred to his own 
administration." 138 

Now, Paul was brought before Gallio at Corinth about the 
year 53, and Claudius reigned A. D. 41-54. Pausanius, Sue- 
tonius, and Dion Cassius agree that the province was already 
then existent, in the close of Claudius's reign. His successor 
Nero, soon after that made the Greeks free, and the Senate 
then lost the province altogether. It thus came to pass as 
stated by Dr. Salmon : "Under Tiberius, Achaia was imperial ; 
under Nero it was independent ; under Claudius it was sena- 
torial, as represented by St. Luke. In Ephesus the mention 
of avOviroLToi [i. e., proconsuls] (Acts xix, 38) is equally cor- 
rect." 139 

It was, then, during this last proconsular period, and not 
long before the province was finally dissolved, that Paul 
appeared before the tribunal of Gallio, who refused to enter- 
tain a charge against him on the score of his religion. 140 By 
reason of these frequent transfers of the province of Achaia 
between emperor and Senate, it would have been more 
than difficult for any writer living in a subsequent century or 
two to furnish an exact history of the political condition of 
the country in detail during those times. Ample proof of this 
is furnished in the case of several classical writers of fame 
who lived remote from the country or the times, but at- 
tempted to give an historical account of the political situation 
of the period, and made egregious errors both with respect to 

™ Annals, i, 76. 138 Claudius, 25. 

»» Introd. N. T. 322. See Tacit. Annals, i, 76; Sueton. Claudius, 25. 

i*o Acts xviii, 14-16. 



456 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

historical facts and the titles of the rulers of the land, as 
is demonstrated by Pitiscus in his notes on Suetonius' s 
Twelve Ocesars, and Cardinal JNTorisius in his Oenotaphium 
Pisanum, 141 as well as in the writings of Tacitus and Celsus. 
Upon the contrary, Luke has written out of the times, without 
any apparent consciousness of difficulty or embarrassment, 
without hesitation or explanation, without strain or affecta- 
tion ; entering into details in a most natural way, recounting 
scenes which stand before the mind like life-pictures, having 
in them the interest and glow of reality, and going before 
the world with a brief record which has proved to be of 
inerrant correctness, to which every new discovery has given 
a fresh affirmation and confirmation. Such exactness in de- 
tails is incompatible with the spirit of mythological or legend- 
ary writings. Luke's carefulness in historical narrative is 
something wonderful; and the easy flow of his style and 
his natural handling of facts are such as become almost self- 
evident of the authenticity and credibility of the things 
which he narrates. 

" If therefore Demetrius and the craftsmen that are with 
him have a matter against a man, the courts are open, and 
§311. The Pro- there are proconsuls." 142 "The town-clerk" 143 
consuls of Asia. was originally a scribe or secretary, who was the 
custodian of the laws, and the public reader of the decrees of 
Greece ; but in Asia Minor he was a magistrate, who was the 
chief of a municipal government. 144 In the Hebraistic sense of 
the term, he was simply a man of learning. 145 In the passage 
cited, the magistrate of Ephesus meant " The courts of law 
are held [for civil action], and there are proconsuls [for the 
trial of criminal causes]." The case presents no difficulty; "but 
it illustrates the Evangelist's accuracy as an historical writer. 

141 Biscoe on Acts, p. 39. 142 'A7opcuoi dyovrac /ecu avdifaraTOL elffiv, Actsxlx, 38. 
143 Tpa/x/jLareiJC. 144 Alford, Greek Testament, in loco. 

!« Smith's Bib. Diet., Vol. IV, p. 3315. See Thayer's Greek Dictionary of the New 
Testament. 



Roman Rulers of the Jews in New Testament. 457 

These are the only references to proconsuls in the New Testa- 
ment. 

This chapter has been occupied with the historical investi- 
gation of the existence, character, and procedures of the 
Roman rulers of Judaea — emperors, legate, pro- 
curators, and proconsuls — and the chief facts and mary and 

• , . t ,-, . , . t Induction. 

incidents occurring under their respective admin- 
istrations, so far as they are alluded to in the historical part of 
the New Testament. The emperors are five in number, — 
Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. Quirinius is 
the one legate whose first tenure of office marks the date of 
the Nativity of Christ, and the correct date for the beginning 
of the Christian era as that now known as B. C. 4. The pro- 
curators are three in number, — Pilate, Felix, and Festus. The 
proconsuls are two, — Sergius Paulus of Cyprus, Gallio of 
Achaia; and others unnamed, but designated as "proconsuls 
in Asia." These officers of the government of Judaea, whose 
procedures are interwoven with the history in the New Testa- 
ment, have been found to be strictly historical in every partic- 
ular. Chief facts and events ; such as, the predicted famine of 
Agabus ; the expulsion of the Jews from Rome ; the historicity 
of the Egyptian impostor; the Roman citizenship of Tarsus 
and Paul; the law protecting a citizen from the punishment 
of scourging; the conversion of Sergius Paulus; the deliver- 
ance of Paul by Gallio at Achaia, — these, and many other 
circumstances of like importance, are fully established by his- 
tory. There are, besides, minor facts but casually mentioned ; 
such as, the presence of the procurator at Jerusalem on the 
national feast-days of the Jews ; the importance attached to 
the tessellated pavement in matters of Roman judicature; the 
law, and Pilate's wife being at Jerusalem when Jesus under- 
went examination before Pilate; Lysias and his purchased 
citizenship ; Festus and the usus of the expression " my lord," — 
these, and many other matters of incidental mention in the 



458 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Scriptures, are minutiae verified both chronologically and his- 
torically. 

Can all such particularizations respecting facts, great and 
small, be found incorporated into the very warp and woof of 
a given narrative and be true, and the narrative yet be false ? 
Can historical evidence go farther in establishing and verr 
fying any occurrences or facts of the ancient past % 



CHAPTER XVI. 

THE JEWISH EULEES OF THE JEWS: HOUSE OF 
THE HEEODS. 

I. First Generation op the Herodian Rulers. 
Herod the Great: King. 
II. Second Generation of the Herodian Rulers. 

1. Herod Archelaus : Ethnarch. 

2. Herod Antipas : Tetrarch. 

3. Herod Philip II : Tetrarch. 

HI. Third Generation op the Herodian Rulers. 

Herod Agrippa I: King. 
IV. Fourth Generation of the Herodian Rulers. 

Herod Agrippa II: King. 
V. The Several Herodian Princesses: 

1. The Princess Herodias. 

2. The Princess Bernice. 

3. The Princess Drusilla. 

459 



Chapter XVI. 

JEWISH EULEES OF THE JEWS : HOUSE OF THE 

HEEODS. 

§ 313. Jewish Rulers of the Jews, and the New Testament. 

Historical evidence, like judicial evidence, is founded on the testimony 
of credible witnesses. ... As all original witnesses must be 
contemporary with the events which they attest, it is a necessary 
condition for the credibility of a witness that he be a contempo- 
rary. . . . Unless, therefore, an historical account can be 
traced by probable proof of the testimony of contemporaries, the 
first condition of historical credibility fails. Accounts 
derived directly or indirectly from the reports of original witnesses 
. . . may be considered as presumptively entitled to credit. — 
Sir G. C. Lewis. 

When the writing which we possess is the writing of a contemporary, 
supposing that it is a credible witness and had means of observing 
the facts to which he testifies, the fact is to be accepted as possess- 
ing the first degree of credibility. — George Rawlinson. 

It would be impossible to point oat any similar period of fifty years in 
English history marked by so many changes ; and it would not 
have been surprising if, supposing them to have been merely 
ordinary writers, those who compiled the narratives contained in 
the New Testament, had evidenced such a sense of difficulty and 
hesitation in the face of political changes, so intricate and so anom- 
alous. But is this what we find ? On the contrary, the writers 
of the New Testament nowhere betray any sense of perplexity 
They mark quite incidentally and without the slightest trace of 
strain or effort the various phases, extraordinary as they were, in 
the civil government of Palestine. — G. F. Maclear. 

ARGUMENT. 

For more than a century the house of the Herods furnished the Jewish 
rulers of the Jews. For five generations the Herodian princes 
were imperially invested by the Romans with the place and power 
of government in this country. The particular epoch, however, 
which interests this discussion is that covered by the first fifty 
years of the Christian era. 

Each prince of this ruling family is recognized in the New 
Testament, in his proper place and character ; and every princess 

461 



462 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



of the household is known and correctly named and represented 
in accordance with the facts and testimony of accredited secular 
history. That which gives an added interest to these notices is 
the fact that each prince and princess is brought forward on some 
special occasion, when the personage appeared in some special 
relation to Jesus Christ or one of his apostles ; and the Evangelists 
introduce in briefest and most casual terms the princely one in 
connection with some new turn in the course of events narrated. 
The question whether the sacred writers were errant in applying 
the title "King" to a mere ethnarch or a tetrarch will receive 
critical attention in its proper place. 

These facts, taken in connection with others, legitimate the 
induction that the sacred writers were the contemporaries of 
the Herods, and were perfectly familiar with the internal govern- 
ment and current history of the land during the first fifty years 
of the Christian era, and with the unparalleled changes and com- 
plications of a political character which occurred in that period. 
The very casual and incidental manner in which persons and oc- 
currences are mentioned, makes powerfully for the authenticity 
of the sacred writings, and are of such a character as to render a 
contrary conclusion not only uncritical, but absolutely irrational. 

1. Herod the Great — King. 

2. Herod Archelaus — Ethnarch. 

3. Herod Antipas — Tetrarch. 

4. Herod Philip II— Tetrarch. 

5. Herod Agrippa I — King. 

6. Herod Agrippa II — King. 

The historical inquiry now passes from the Roman rulers 
of the Jews in Judaea to the Jewish rulers of the Jews under 

the princes of the house of the Herods. The Ro- 
Preiiminary mans and Jews alternated at different times in 

the government of the country. Tacitus is author- 
ity for the statement that, in the year 63 or 64 B. C, "Pom- 
pey was the first Roman that subdued the Jews." 1 From this 
time forth the domination of the conquerors became gradually 
more and more severe and cruel, until the exasperating des- 
potism of the Roman procurators incited a universal revolt of 
the Jews, the suppression of which issued in the utter extinc- 
tion of the Jewish nation, the burning of their temple, and the 
expatriation of the people, in the year 70. An interesting field 

» History, v, 9. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews: House of the Herods. 463 

for investigation is here opened respecting the Herods, the 
Jewish rulers who were placed in power by the Komans, and 
a wealth of incidents which occurred in the first half -century 
of the Herodian reign finds frequent allusions in the historical 
New Testament. The nameless complications and perplexities 
arising therefrom, to the subjects of civil government, conse- 
quent upon the sudden and numerous changes of rulers and 
territory during that period, have already passed under re- 
view. 2 This chapter is interested principally in the personnel 
of these rulers, especially at points where the history of their 
reign overlaps the sacred narrative. 

I. The First Generation of the Herods. 

HEBOD THE GREAT (B. C. 47-4). 

Antipater was the father of Herod the Great, and was 
much in favor with the Roman Government. Julius Caesar, in 
the year B. C. 47, appointed the father procurator §3 i 5 . origin 
of Judaea. 3 He was of Idumaean stock, better of Herod - 
known as an Edomite, a descendant of Esau. 4 John Hyrcanus, 
having conquered the Idumaeans, brought them into the Ju- 
daean Government, and, conforming to the requirements of the 
Jewish circumcision, they embraced the Jewish religion. But 
they were always regarded with prejudice and suspicion by 
the Jews, who styled the Idumaeans but " half- Jews. " 5 They 
occupied a southern district lying between the Mediterranean 
and the Dead Sea and southward, a country known as Nageb. 
Herod was the second son of Antipater and his Arabian wife 
Cypros, who was of noble blood. 6 

About the time of the father's appointment to the procu- 
ratorship of Judaea, Herod was made "procurator of all Syria," 
with the promise that he should be made " king of Judaea ;" 7 
and his father "committed Galilee to Herod" "when he was 



2 See chapter xiv. 

*Ant. xiv, 8, 5. *Ib. xiv, 8, 5; Wars, i, 10, 3; Smith's Bib. Did.: "Idumaeans." 

SAnt. xiii, 9,1; Ant. xiv, 15, 2; xx, 8, 7. 6Z6. xlv . 7>3; wars, i, 8, 9. Tib. i, 11,4. 

30 



464 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

but fifteen years of age" 8 — probably twenty-five is here meant. 
In 41 B. C, Mark Antony "made both Herod and Phasaelus 

[his elder brother] tetrarchs, and committed the 
Herod's public affairs to them;" 9 and during the next 

year the Parthians invaded his dominions in 
favor of Antigonus, the Asmonean rival of Herod, and the 
rightful heir apparent to the throne, when Herod fled to Kome 
for help. 10 Tacitus records that "Herod was placed on the 
throne by Mark Antony, and Augustus [Caesar] enlarged his 
privileges." n But Herod could not assert his royal privileges 
and rights over Palestine until, with the help of the Komans, 
he had captured Jerusalem in the year 37 B. C. Nevertheless 
his coronation and enthronement were made an occasion of 
great magnificence by Caesar. 12 Josephus relates that — 

" When Caesar had spoken such gracious things to the King [Herod], 
and had put the diadem again upon his head, he proclaimed by decree 
what he had bestowed upon him, and which he enlarged in the commen- 
dation after a magnificent manner." 

Herod the Great had a great passion for display in mag- 
nificent architecture and monuments, as also had all his ruling 
™„ xt „, descendants after him. As Jerusalem was the 

§317. Herod's 

Architectural metropolis of the Jewish nation, he adorned the 
city munificently with architectural monuments. 
To conciliate the Jews, who had been alienated by his contin- 
uous aggravations and cruelties as their sovereign, with much 
address he proposed to reconstruct the ancient temple of Sol- 
omon, which had become dilapidated and somewhat moss- 
covered by the passage of the centuries. But it was shrewdly 
suspected by the Jews that Herod's real object was to get into 
his possession the public genealogies of the nations deposited 
there, especially those relating to the priestly families, unto 
whom these tables were of paramount interest and importance. 

s Ant. xiv, 9, 2; comp. Whiston's Note, and Merivale's Homans Under the 
Empire, iii, 37. 

*Ant. xiv, 13, 1, 2; Wars, i, 12, 5. ™Ant. xiv, 14, 3; Wars, i, 14, 4, 2. 

» Hist. Bom. v, 9. 12 Wars, i, 20, 3. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews : House of the Herods. 465 

It was believed that he hoped thereby to destroy the gene- 
alogy of the expected Messiah, and so destroy the evidence of 
his kingship, lest he should usurp his kingdom. Be that as it 
may, he endeavored to create the belief that he was doing his 
Jewish subjects a great kindness without cost to them ; and he 
promised that he would not build a new temple, but merely 
restore that built by David's son to its ancient magnificence ; 
for the restoration attempted by Zerubbabel upon the return 
of Israel from the captivity of Babylon appears to have fallen 
short in measurement of the ancient architecture, in height 
some sixty cubits, 13 and the whole was becoming marked with 
age and decay. Accordingly, Herod took down the old temple 
to its foundations, and engaged one thousand wagons to draw 
stones, and ten thousand skilled workmen to teach the priests 
the art of stonecutting and carpentering. 14 

The temple proper which Herod erected was one hundred 
cubits in length and twenty cubits in height. It was con- 
structed of white stone, each one being five cubits long and 
eight high. Surmounting this structure was a great white 
dome, adorned with pinnacles of gold, suggestive of a moun- 
tain of snow as seen from afar. A Jewish tradition affirms 
that " the temple itself was built by the priests in one year 
and six months, when they celebrated its completion with 
Jewish feast and sacrifices; but that the cloisters and outer 
inclosures were eight years in building." However that may 
be, it is clear that additions were made continually from year 
to year ; so that, though Herod began the restoration in the 
year 20 B. C, as a whole it was literally true that the temple 
was "built in forty and six years," 15 as the Jews affirmed unto 
Jesus. But the end was not yet, for the work was continued 
up to A. D. 64, just six years before the destruction of the 
temple by the Roman soldiers under Titus. And even when 
Vespasian made his invasion of Palestine to subdue the Jews 
in their revolt, Herod's great-grandson, Herod Agrippa II, 

KAnt. xv, 11, 1. l *Ib. xv, 11, 2, 3. i& John ii, 20. 



466 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

was engaged in expensive preparations to "raise the holy- 
house twenty cubits higher." 16 But the Koman army burned 
down the temple on the Jewish Sabbath, August 10, A. D. 70. 

Near the^same time Herod rebuilt the temple of the Samar- 
itans, who also were Jiis subjects, " out of a desire to make 
the city more eminent than it had been before, but principally 
because he contrived that it might at once be for his own 
security and a monument of his magnificence." 17 He is also 
credited with having erected a monument over the royal tombs 
at Jerusalem, after having attempted to rob the dead of their 
treasures, " such as furniture of gold and precious goods that 
were laid up there." 18 

He was not always loyal to the emperor who had appointed 
him to place and power to rule the Jewish nation. 

Herod's History relates that on one occasion he had made 
character. war U p 0n an A ra bi an prince without having first 

received the imperial consent. This was a very great offense 
to Augustus Caesar, who 

" Asked no more than this one question, both of Herod's friends that 
were there, and of his own friends who were come from Syria ; [namely], 
Whether Herod had led an army thither [into Arabia]? And when 
they were forced to confess so much, Caesar, without staying to hear for 
what reason he did it, and how it was done, grew very angry, and wrote 
to Herod sharply. The sum of this epistle was this: ''That whereas of 
old he had used him as his friend, he should now use him as his subject.' " 10 

In race, Herod was an Idumaean ; in religion, a Jew ; but 
he was a heathen in practice, and a monster in character. 
Extremely suspicious and jealous in disposition, he was quick 
to resent or avenge any supposed wrong with death, when re- 
lating to himself or his royalty. Crafty in his schemes, he 
was arbitrary and despotic in the exercise of his kingly power. 
But to none of his subjects was he so mercilessly cruel as to 
the members of his own family and their friends whom his 
barbarity had so completely alienated in their feelings. Jo- 

16 Wars, v. 1, 5. " Ant. xv, 8, 5. ™Ib. xvi, 7, 1. ™Ib. xvi, 9, 3. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews: House of the Herods. 467 

sephus informs us that Herod had nine wives, 20 and on the 
merest suspicion of treachery he put Mariamne, his favorite 
and worthiest one, to death ; 21 also her grandfather Hyrcanus ; ffl 
also her brother Aristobulus ; a also his own three sons, Aris- 
tobulus, Alexander, 24 and Antipater; the last being executed 
by his order when Herod himself was on his death-bed, just 
five days before he died. ^ And to add to his infamy, he called 
together the principal men of his kingdom, whom he shut up 
in the hippodrome at Jericho, where he was ill, with a view to 
their massacre, giving orders that after his own death they all 
should be slain, in order that the distress and lamentation 
which would be national on their account, should seem to the 
people to be " the honor of a memorable mourning at his [own] 
funeral Z" 26 But the order was never executed. 27 The king 
had assumed to himself the title " Herod the Great," while it is 
obvious that he was so great in nothing as in crimes. The 
characterization of this royal wretch was but just, said to 
have been given by Augustus Caesar, knowing the king was a 
Jew and had slain his third son when on his death-bed : " It 
is better to be HerooVs hog than to be his son/" * 

In view of the facts narrated by the Jewish historian Jo- 
sephus, who was a contemporary of the Evangelists, it is very 
easv to understand and verv difficult to disbelieve 

J J §319. Herod 

the truth of the story respecting Herod's procedure and 
toward the infant Jesus at Bethlehem. Apart 
from the sacred narrative, Josephus leaves no rational ground 
from which to dispute the distinct statement that Herod did 
"seek the young Child to destroy him." 29 The sufficient mo- 
tive was realized when the Magi came to Jerusalem and asked 
of Herod himself : " Where is he that is born King of the Jews ?" 
That inquiry aroused the king's jealousy, so that he and the 

*> Wars, i, 28, 4; Ant. xvii, 1, 3. 21 Ant. xv, 7, 4; Wars, i, 22, 4, 5. 

&Ant. xv, 6, 2, close. **i&.xv, 3,3. 24 j&.xvi,ll, 7; Wars, ii, 11, 6, close. 

™Ant. xvii, 7, 1 ; Wars, i, 33, 7, 8. » Ant. xvii, 6, 5; Wars, 1, 33, 6. 

"Ant. xvii, 8, 2; Wars, i, 33, 6. 

28 "Melius est Herodis porcum esse quam fllium," Macrobius, Saturnal, ii, 4» 

» Matt, ii, 13. 



468 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

city were filled with consternation; for " when Herod the king 
heard it, he was troubled and all Jerusalem with him." ^ A 
brief review of the facts narrated, will render this conclusion 
obvious. 

Only two Evangelists advert to the circumstances of Christ's 

nativity, mentioning Herod by name, designating his royalty, 

«~™ „. and locating his realm. Matthew writes of 

§ 320. King ° 

Herod " Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the 

ospe . ki n g.»a an( } Luke c ites other interesting facts 
which occurred " in the days of Herod the king of Judsea." a 
The time being thus associated with the birth of Jesus, Herod 
the king is conclusively identified for all the purposes of his- 
tory. King Herod being thoroughly aroused respecting the 
supposed danger of his losing his throne by reason of this 
recent royal birth, he naturally calls together the chief priests 
and scribes, and makes careful inquiry of them "where Christ 
should be born." 33 The next step is to engage the Magi as 
detectives to discover and report to him the Child who was 
"born king of the Jews," under the pretense that Herod 
would also come and worship him. He said : " Go and search 
out carefully concerning the young Child, and when ye have 
found him, bring me word that I may come and worship 
him also." 34 The purpose of the assassin is adroitly con- 
cealed under the pretense of a desire to worship his supposed 
supplanter! The depth of this treacherous insincerity is 
revealed and attested by the sequel. The Magi do not return 
to Herod, and his scheme of secret service fails. Thereupon 
" Herod was exceeding wroth, and sent forth and slew all the 
male children^ that were in Bethlehem and all the borders 
thereof, from two years old and younger, according to the 
time which he had carefully learned of the wise men." This 
account of Herod by the Evangelist is not only consistent with 
itself in its cumulative character, but accordant with the char- 
acteristics of Herod as represented by the Jewish historian, 

30Matt.il. 3. 8l /6. II, 1. 32L U kei,5. 33 Matt, ii, 4. «J6.ii,8. 

36 lb. ii, 16. The gender in Greek is masculine: ir&vTas tovs iraidas. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews: House of the Herods. 469 

There is no known reason in the history of the facts narrated 
by Josephus in his characterization of Herod the Great but 
compels our belief in Matthew's statement of this circum- 
stance, which is but a mere detail in Herod's life and reign. 
To reject both without a sufficient reason would be highly 
irrational, if not absurd. 

II. The Second Generation of the Herods. 

Three Sons and Successors of Herod the Great. 

AKCHELAUS— PHILIP II— ANTIPAS. 

Objection has been made against the accuracy of the his- 
torical New Testament on the ground that the sacred writers 
designate the Herodian princes by one set of 
names, but secular historians by others which the 

are assumed to be correct. The synoptists uni- 
formly call the tetrarch of Galilee "Herod," while Josephus 
and other accredited historians call him "Antipas." It is 
thence inferred that the Evangelists betray an ignorance 
of the persons and names of the royal family, and histor- 
ically erred, and must have written in a later period than is 
commonly claimed. Now, not only is the case not proved, 
but, upon the contrary, the criticism is invalidated by the 
facts. It will be seen that both classes of writers are unquali- 
fiedly correct in designating the house of the Herods just as 
they have done. 

a) It should be carefully noted that the appellation 
"Herod" was not the personal name of any one prince, but 
the family name of all the princes ; the surname of four gen- 
erations of the Herodian house mentioned in the Scriptures of 
the New Testament. Accordingly, written in full, the proper 
names of the several princes were Herod Archelaus, Herod 
Antipas, Herod Philip II, Herod Agrippa I, and Herod Agrippa 
II. Such is the historical fact. Now, so far from proving a dis- 
crepancy between the secular and sacred writers, and raising 
thereupon a presumption against these Scriptures as being un- 



470 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

historical, the case raises a powerful presumption in their 
favor. That is, the usus being found to be entirely correct, 
there is the necessary implication that the Evangelists were 
the contemporaries of the facts which they relate, and were 
perfectly understood by those addressed of that age without 
explanations. An historian would be perfectly understood in 
writing the surname Washington, without any historical rea- 
son to prefix the personal name George. 

ft) But the objection alleged fails fatally when it claims to 
be founded on fact, that secular writers use one set of names 
to the exclusion of the other names. The case of Antipas is 
cited in illustration, whereas it proves the very contrary of 
that claimed. Josephus, as well as the apostles, was a sub- 
ject of the Herodian government, and presumably knew 
critically the names of the rulers of whom, as an historian, he 
had so much to write. He names this tetrarch both "Herod" 
and "Antipas" interchangeably; and even takes pains to 
explain the identity of the person so named. He says : " Now 
as the ethnarchy of Archelaus was fallen into a Roman 
province, the other sons of Herod [the Great, viz.], Philip and 
that Herod who was called Antipas" 36 Luke mentions this te- 
trarch as "Herod," and "Herod the tetrarch," and as "Herod 
the tetrarch of Galilee" in the same chapter, 37 while Josephus 
repeatedly calls him " Herod the tetrarch," ffl and " Herod the 
tetrarch of Galilee," ® and " that Herod who was called Anti- 
pas." 40 The identification, therefore, is perfect as regards the 
person, the official title, the political geography, and Luke's 
references and names are proved to be strictly historical. 

Herod the Great was especially favored by Augustus with 

the privilege of bestowing his realm upon his children by will, 

, subject to the approval and confirmation of 

fcj 322. Hsroci s 

sons and Caesar. 41 After Herod's death the three sons 
His Kingdom. ment i one d m ^q w ^ anc [ others of the royal 

household, presented themselves before the emperor to have 

w» Wars, ii, 9, 1. * Gospel iii, 1, 19. ** Ant. xviii, 2, 3 ; Wars, i, 88, 7 ; ii, 9, 6. 

so A nt. xviii, 7, 1, 2. «> Wars, ii, 9, 1. 41 lb. i, 33, 8. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews: House of the Herods. 471 

their several appointments ratified by imperial authority. Jo- 

sephus records : 

" So Caesar, after he heard both sides, dissolved the assembly for the 
time ; but a few days afterward he gave one-half of Herod's kingdom to 
Archelaus by the name of ethnarch [i. e., ruler of a people in a princi- 
pality], and promised to make him king afterwards, if he rendered 
himself worthy of that dignity ; but as to the other half, he divided it 
into two tetrarchies [each equal to one fourth of a province], and gave 
them to the other two sons of Herod ; the one of them to Philip [II] and 
the other to Antipas." * 

Tacitus made note that 

" On the death of Herod a man by the name of Simon, without 
waiting for the authority of the emperor, seized the sovereignty. He, 
however, was punished for his ambition by Quintilius Varus, the gov- 
ernor of Syria; and the nation, reduced to submission, was divided in 
three portions between the sons of Herod." ^ 

Herod's kingdom covered all Palestine, including Idu- 
maea, and upon his death was divided among his three sons 
as indicated. Taken in the order of their ages, Archelaus 
was made ethnarch of one-half of Herod's kingdom, and 
included Samaria, Judasa, and Idumaaa, which he ruled for ten 
years, from B. C. 4 to 6 A. D. Herod Philip II was appointed 
tetrarch of one-fourth of the realm located in Northeastern 
Palestine, and included Batansea, Trachonitis, and Auronitis 
[Gaulonitis], and parts of Jamnia. 44 Herod Antipas became 
tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea, 45 and included the remaining 
fourth of the original territory. 

There exists a coin struck by Philip II for his principality, 
which furnishes an incontestable proof, verifying the histor- 
ical veracity of both Josephus and the Evangel- § 32 3. Numis- 
ists in styling Herod Philip II " a tetrarch," and matic Evidence, 
"tetrarch of Iturasa." It bears the following superscrip- 
scription and legend, namely : 

Obverse: "Tiberius Augustus Caesar;" 
Eeverse: " Of Philip, Tetrarch ;" 
with the legend, L A Z, or 37, the year of our Lord's Crucifixion. 46 

42 Wars, ii, 6, 3 ; comp. Ant. xvii, 8, 1 ; 11, 4. « Hist. Rom. v, 9. 

« A nt. xvii, 1, 3 ; xvii, 8, 1 ; 11, 4. 45 j&. xvlij 1, 3 ; xvi i, g, 1 ; Wars, i, 33, 7. 

^Obv: Ti/3eptos- liefHaaroz Kcucrap. Rev: 4>tXt7T7rou Ter[papxov]. 



472 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Another coin is in existence, which was struck by Herod 
Antipas during his rule in his tetrarchy, dating in the year in 
which our Lord began his ministry. It reads thus : 

Obverse: " Of Herod the tetrarch." 

Reverse : " Tiberias, the Capital of the Tetrarchy." 

It also bears a palm-branch and the legend "LAT" or [331]. 47 

II. Second Generation of the Herods. 

HEROD ARCHELAUS: (B. C. 4-6 A. D.) 

This son was the eldest 48 of the three who succeeded Herod 

the Great in the rule of the Jews in Palestine. The mother 

~«„ * r. of Archelaus was Malthake\ a Samaritan woman. 

§324. Arche- ' 

laus and his With the example of his father constantly before 
his eyes, it was natural that the character of this 
prince should be extremely bad, both as a man and as a ruler. 
When his father's will was to be submitted to the emperor at 
Kome for confirmation, the other members of the royal family 
were present and strongly opposed its provision to make Ar- 
chelaus a king; and Augustus denied him a kingdom, but 
accompanied the denial with a conditional promise, which was 
never realized, that he would in the future confer upon him 
that dignity if he should prove himself worthy of it. 49 
Instead, he made him an ethnarch, and for his realm gave 
him one-half of his father's territory, embracing Samaria, Ju- 
dsea, and Idumaea. But Archelaus at once usurped kingly 
prerogatives against imperial authority. Soon his procedures 
produced tumults, revolt, and massacre. In less than a decade 
he had more than justified the urgent protests of the family 
against his receiving royalty ; and even his subjects sent am- 
bassadors to Augustus to expose his cruelties, who charged 
him with having usurped the prerogatives of a sovereign, "in 
changing the commanders of the army ; in setting up a royal 
throne before he was made king, and in determining law- 
suits, all done as if he were no other than a king;" that 

«Obv: HpwSou rerpapxov. Rev: Ti/3epea$\ See Lewin, Life and Epis. of St. 
Paul, i, 17. 

*8 Wars, 1, 33, 7. « Ant. xvii, 11. 4: Wars, ii, 6, 8; 11,7, 3. 



Realms of ARCHELAUS, ANTIPAS, and PHILIP II. 

B. C. 4-7. D. 6. B. C. 4-7. D. 39. B. C. 4-A. D. 33. 




Jewish Ruleks of the Jews : House of the Herods. 473 

Archelaus had slain three thousand men like "sacrifices . . . 
till the temple was full of dead bodies ; and all this was done, 
not as an alien, but by one who pretended to the lawful 
title of king." » 

When in the act of celebrating the Passover feast, Arche- 
laus was put under arrest and hurried off to Rome to answer 
to the emperor for his cruelties and crimes. The result was, 
that he was deposed from his government in the tenth year of 
his ruling, his estates were confiscated, and his person was 
sent into perpetual banishment at Vienna in Gaul 51 [France], 
and his territory was reduced to a Roman province. It was 
attached to Syria, which was under the presidency of Quin- 
tilius Yarus, and under the special superintendence of Quirin- 
ius (Cyrenius) in respect to its financial affairs 52 as propraetor, 
and under the immediate government of Coponius as procura- 
tor. 53 Quirinius thoroughly adjusted the new relation of 
Judaea to the empire, and so reconstructed the internal 
constitution for order that he was called the lawgiver 54 of the 
country. 

This is the time when Quirinius made his second en- 
rollment of Judaea ; for it will be remembered that in B. C. 
4, he effected the registration of the population ; and now, in 
A. D. 6, it was to obtain the registration of the property, 55 as 
the new province was tributary to the empire. As to Coponius, 
it is the first time that the procurator was imperially invested 
with absolute power over life and death, which power was 
then withdrawn from the Jewish Sanhedrin 56 at Jerusalem. 
" With Archelaus ended all remaining semblance of the mon- 
archy. The scepter had departed from Judah." 57 It is under- 
stood that Paul was born A. D. 2. 58 



6o^4n*.xvii, 9.3-5; Wars, ii, 7, 3. ^ Ant. xvii, 13, 2; Wars, ii, 6, 1, 2; ii, 7, 3. 

52 Ant. xviii, 1, 1 ; xviii, 2, 1 ; Wars, vii, 8, 1. 
MAnt. xviii, 1, 1; xviii, 2, 1, 2; Wars, ii, 8, 1. 

54 AiKaiodoTw?, Ant. xviii, 1, 1. 

55 Ant. xviii, 1, 1 ; Wars, ii, 8, 1 ; comp. Luke ii, 1, 2, and Acts v, 37. 
se Wars, ii, 8, 1 ; John xviii, 31 ; xix, 10. 

57 Farrar. 68 Lewin. 



474 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Upon the reduction of the ethnarchy to a Roman province, 
Judaea became more intensely Roman than ever before. 
Roman money circulated freely in the markets of the Jews ; 
Roman words became current in the language of the people ; 
Roman monuments were constructed in honor of the em- 
peror ; Roman buildings were erected for the accommodation 
of the garrisons ; cities were adorned and elevated and given 
Roman names; Betharamptha, already a city, was "called 
Julias, from the name of the emperor's wife ;" the tetrarch 
Philip advanced Bethsaida to the dignity of a city, and called 
it Julias, in honor of Caesar's daughter; and at the foun- 
tain of the Jordan he built up Paneas, and named it Caesarea- 
Philippi in honor of Caesar; while Herod Antipas built a city 
on the west side of the sea and called it Tiberias, in honor 
of the Emperor Tiberius. 59 

A single reference is made in the New Testament to Herod 

Archelaus, and it is exceedingly brief and incidental to the 

narrative given. It is, however, in exact ac- 

§ 325. Arche- & ' ' 

laus and the cordance with his character. The allusion relates 
probably to the close of the first year of 
Christ's infancy, when Joseph and Mary were returning from 
Egypt, intending to go to Galilee by way of Jerusalem : 

" But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judaea in the 
room of his father Herod [the Great], he was afraid to go thither; and 
being warned of God in a dream, he withdrew into the parts of Galilee, 
and came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth." 60 

a) Objection has been made with reference to this passage, 
that Matthew fell into error in saying that Archelaus "was 
reigning" an expression which is exact only when applied to 
a king, and not when applied to an ethnarch. In reply, it is 
to be said that the usus of the term "reign" at that time must 
govern in any such case, and Matthew wrote in strict accord- 
ancy with the usage of his times. It is not fair criticism to 
determine accuracy or error of a writer by a modern restric- 
ts Ant. xviii, 2, 1, 2. «o Matthew ii, 22, 23. 



Jewish Rulees of the Jews: House of the Herods. 475 

tion put upon a word which was wholly unknown in the usage 
of the ancients. The exclusive application of the term "reign" 
to royalty is modern, and without force in the case in hand.* 
j3) But the criticism is fallacious in that Matthew is not 
making an original statement of his own on his own responsi- 
bility, but he has merely placed on record what the report was 
which Joseph heard: "But when he heard that Archelaus was 
reigning over Judaea in the room of his father Herod," etc. 
To record aright the rumor which Joseph "heard" is Mat- 
thew's part, and there his responsibility ends. Moreover, the 
report was probably based upon the fact that Herod the Great 
had provided in his will that Archelaus should be made king 
of Judaea and Peraea, and upon the opening of the will at 
Jericho, the soldiers and people made acclamation and con- 
gratulation that he was to be advanced to royalty. But 
Caesar did not approve this provision. 61 

HEEOD PHILIP II (B. C. 4-34 A. D.) 
This prince, the second ruling prince in age, was the son of 
Herod the Great and Cleopatra. 62 He must be carefully dis- 
tinguished from his half-brother Philip I, the son 

& r ' §326. Philip II 

of Herod the Great and Mariamne, Herod's the 

favorite wife, whom he slew. By his will, Mari- Tetrarch - 
amne's son, Philip, was excluded from having any share in the 
government, on his mother's account. 63 He married Herodias, 
and they had one child named Salome. Herodias afterwards 
eloped with Herod Antipas. Salome seems to have accompa- 
nied her mother, and, at the instigation of the mother, de- 
manded the head of John the Baptist. Cleopatra's son, 
Philip II, married Salome, who was his niece. 64 He was the 
tetrarch of Ituraea, whose subjects were mostly Syrians and 
Greeks, but very loyal to the tetrarch. In secular history, 
Philip II is represented as a peaceful and successful ruler of 

*See this principle discussed fully under Herod Antipas. 

nWars, i, 33, 8, 9; Ant. xvii, 8, 1, 2; xvii, 6, 1. 

«* Ant. xvii, 1, 3; xviii, 5, 4; Wars, i, 28, 4. **Wars, i, 30, 7. "Ant. xviii, 5, 4. 



476 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

his tetrarchy for a period of thirty-seven years, and was "a 
person of moderation and quietness in the conduct of his life 
and government," who had such consideration for his people 
that whither he went in travel he was accompanied by his 
tribunal, ready at any time to stop and ascend the seat of jus- 
tice to adjudicate cases for cause. He died in A. D. 34, in the 
twentieth year of the reign of Tiberius. He was much be- 
loved, and "when he was carried to his monument, which he 
had already erected for himself beforehand, he was buried 
with great pomp." ffi He left no child to succeed him in the 
government, and his territory was annexed to the province of 
Syria. Philip II had the distinction of being the first Jewish 
prince who had images struck on his coins 66 — a circumstance 
which was remarkable in that the Jews regarded themselves 
prohibited by the commandment from making images of any 

kind in art. 

Four persons named Philip are mentioned 

§ 327. Th© T©- 

trarch in the in the historical New Testament. These are — 
Gospels. ^ Philip the disciple and apostle of Christ; 67 

/3) Philip the deacon and evangelist; 68 
y) Philip I, son of Mariamne, who married Herodias; 69 
8) Philip II, son of Cleopatra, the "tetrarch of Ituraea." 70 
Reference is made also to the city built by this tetrarch in 
honor of the emperor, at the base of Mount Hermon, called 
Caesarea-Philippi, which, in sacred geography, is to be dis- 
tinguished from Csesarea-on-the-Sea. It was at or near this 
city, in the northern extreme of Palestine, that Jesus engaged 
his disciples in the memorable conversation respecting the 
opinions entertained of himself, when he asked: 

" Whom do men say that the Son of man is? . . . But whom say 
ye that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said : Thou art the Christ, 
the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him: 
Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah ; for flesh and blood hath not 

* Ant. xviii, 4, 6. 

« Madden, Jewish Coins; Lewin, Life and Epis. of St. Paul, 1, 17. 

« Matt, x, 3; Acts i, 13. "Acts vi, 5; viii, 26-40; xxi, 8. 

69 Mark vi, 17. ™ Luke iii, 1. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews : House of the Hekods. 477 

revealed it unto thee, but my Father who is in heaven." "And he 
began to teach them that the Son of man must suffer many things, and 
be rejected by the elders and chief priests, and be killed, and after three 
days rise again." 71 

No other references are made in the New Testament to 
Herod Philip II, "tetrarch of Itursea." 

HEROD ANTIPAS (B. C. 4-39 A. D.) 

This prince was the youngest son of Herod the Great and 
Malthake. 72 Josephus says that the mother of Herod Antipas 
" was of the Samaritan nation, whose sons were 

§328. History 

Antipas and Archelaus ; " 73 that on his death-bed of 

the father "altered his testament, ... for An paa 
he appointed Antipas, to whom before he had left the king- 
dom, to be tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea." 74 "And he made 
Antipas tetrarch." 75 

As a ruler he was regarded as "sly, ambitious, luxurious, 
but not so able as his father." % Hausrath does him the scant 
courtesy of calling him "a wily sneak." Of Antipas, Jesus 
said : " Go tell that fox, Behold I cast out devils." "" His ad- 
ministration was characterized by cunning and crime, for he 
was intensely selfish and utterly destitute of principle. In the 
year 37 the Emperor Tiberius died, and he was immediately 
succeeded by Caius Caligula. This emperor soon discovered 
the real character of Herod Antipas. Moreover, that he was 
disloyal to the imperial throne was evidenced by the discovery 
that Antipas had been intriguing with one Sejanus, a Koman 
officer of the army, and had confederated with Artabanus, 
King of Parthia, against the Koman Empire, and had laid in 
store armor for seventy thousand men of war. Upon the 
proof of this procedure by his own nephew, Herod Agrippa I, 
who was the devoted friend of the emperor, Caius Caligula, in 
the year 39, "took away his tetrarchy and gave it to Herod 

"Matt, xvi, 13-17; Mark viii, 27-31. 

™Wars, i, 28, 4; Ant. xvli, 6, 1. ™AnL xvii, 1, 3. ™Ib. xvii, 8, 1. 

» Wars, i, 33, 7. 76 Schtirer. w Luke xiii, 32. 



478 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



Agrippa," who had exposed the intrigue, and Antipas was 
sent into perpetual banishment in France and Spain, where he 
died. On this point Josephus says : 

" So he [i. e., Caligula] took from him his tetrarchy, and gave it by 
way of addition to Agrippa's kingdom ; he also gave Herod Antipas' s 
money to Agrippa, and by way of punishment awarded him a perpetual 
banishment, and appointed Lyons, a city in Gaul, as the place of his 
habitation." " So Herod died in Spain. 5 ' 78 Dion Cassius adds: " Herod 
the Palestinean, having given a certain occasion by reason of his broth- 
ers, was banished beyond the Alps, and his portion [estates] of the gov- 
ernment confiscated to the State." 79 



What brought to pass this state of affairs was this. Anti- 
pas had been for a long time urged by his wife Herodias to go 
to Rome and request the emperor to bestow upon him the 
kingly crown. He was extremely envious of his nephew, 
Agrippa I, who had suddenly risen, from being in prison 
under Tiberius, to receiving a kingdom under Caligula. Anti- 
pas had deeply offended Agrippa by insulting reflections on 
his former condition, before royalty had been bestowed upon 
him. Meantime Agrippa maintained a confidential intimacy 
with the emperor, and kept him posted regarding these move- 
ments and projects of Antipas. When, then, Antipas started 
for Rome in quest of his own interests, accompanied by his 
wife, Agrippa instantly sent his freedman, named Fortunatus, 
to Rome also, bearing the necessary documents in proof of the 
accusations to be made against Antipas; and Agrippa followed 
in a few days further to confront his uncle in the presence of 
the emperor. Antipas had arrived, and was having his first 
interview with Caligula, when Fortunatus entered into the 
presence of the emperor and placed in his hands the letters in 
his possession. Agrippa arriving very soon, and all the accu- 
sations being now well understood by all parties, he challenged 
Antipas to deny the confederating with Sejanus and with 
Artabanus, and his secret storing of arms in perfidy against 

i*Ant. xviil, 7, 1, 2; Wars, ii, 9, 6. ™Hist. of Rome, B. lv, Aug. 27. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews: House of the Herods. 479 

the imperial government. As Antipas could not deny the 
accusations, he confessed his guilt. 80 

Turning to the Scriptures, Herod Antipas is frequently re- 
ferred to in the first two Gospels as being " a Icing; " whereas 
Josephus distinctly states that kingship was the 

§ 329. A-HtipB/S 

thing denied him, and that he was "made te- as 

trarch " in his government. Criticism accordingly 
claims that this discrepancy in the writers is evidence that the 
Evangelists erred. Matthew designates Antipas both as te- 
trarch and king in the same chapter. Mark invariably calls 
him a king, and frequently in the same chapter. Upon the 
other hand, Luke invariably designates him as a tetrarch. 

Matthew says: " Herod the tetrarch heard the report concerning 
Jesus." . . . And again: " The king was grieved." 81 Mark says: 
"The king heard thereof;" "and the king said unto the damsel;" 
" and she came straightway with haste unto the king ; " and " the king 
was exceeding sorry ; " and " the king sent a soldier of the guard," 82 etc. 
Luke, however, says: " Herod being tetrarch of Galilee ; " " Herod the 
tetrarch being reproved by him;" "Now Herod the tetrarch heard of 
all that was done;" and " Manaen, the foster-brother of Herod the 
tetrarch." 83 

Now, it is obvious that this frequency of the title " king '' 
was not a matter of inadvertance, but of design, in the sacred 
writers, and there must be some good reason for its use. The 
case demands an explanation. Even some eminent scholars 
seem to have felt embarrassed, prior to investigation, perhaps.* 
At any rate the only justifying reason for the Evangelists' 
usage in employing the terms "king" and "tetrarch" inter- 
changeably, is the etymological reason. As in the case of 
Archelaus "reigning" in his father's stead, so here in the case 
of Herod Antipas and the cognate appellation "king." We 
have only to difference the modern idea and usus from the 

*Alford says: " Herod was not king properly, but only tetrarch." Westcott 
says : " He was called king by courtesy." Farrar says : " It is only popularly that 
he is called king." Whedon says that he was called king " in compliance with 
custom." 

&>Ant. xviii, 7, 1, 2. si Matt, xiv, 1,9. 82 Mark vi, 14, 22-27. 

MLuke iii, 1, rerpapx^ ', Terpdpxv?, iii, 19; ix, 7; Acts xiii, 1. 
31 



480 Histoeical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ancient to have the sufficient explanation. For we now apply 
this appellative exclusively to royalty, whereas at that period 
it applied not only to a sovereign, but "in a general and lower 
sense it applied equally to a prince, ruler, viceroy, and the 
like; " M " to a king's son, a prince, or any one sharing in the 
government, . . . and, after Augustus, to any great man"® 
Josephus himself, indeed, who so constantly designates Herod 
Antipas as having been made "tetrarch" by his father's will, 
employs this usage when he says that his father "sent also for 
his testament and altered it, and therein made Antipas king." * 
The ancient usus in distinction from the modern being con- 
sidered, the difficulty at once disappears. 

Herod Antipas was twice married ; first to the daughter of 
Aretas, an Arabian king of Petrsea. Nevertheless, he in- 
trigued with Herodias, who was then the wife of 

§330. Baptist ° 

and Herod Philip I, the son of Mariamne, in whose 

Antipas. h ouse Antipas was a guest. 87 Antipas and Hero- 
dias eloped together, although both were married at the time. 
Herodias was a granddaughter of Herod the Great, and sister 
of Herod Agrippa I. Now the scandalous conduct of Antipas 
and Herodias is pointedly referred to in the three Synoptic 
Gospels which cite the reproof administered by John the 
Baptist to the tetrarch Herod Antipas. " For John said, It is 
not lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife;" and Luke 
adds: "Herod [Antipas] the tetrarch being reproved by him 
for Herodias, Philip's wife, and for all the evils which he had 
done, added yet this above all, that he shut up John in 
prison." 88 * 

From the time that Herod Antipas had slain the Baptist, 
this crime haunted his conscience. When, then, he heard of 
the miracles done by Jesus, " he was perplexed, because it was 

*See chap, iv, $$ 69-76, and Herodias in this chapter, $$343-345. 

s* Robinson's Greek Diet, of JV. T., Baa-iXevg- and /Sao-tXetfw. 

«Liddell and Scott, Or. Diet., 1883, BatriXetfw. ^Wars, i, 32, 7, and i, 33, 8. 

VAnt. xviii, 5, 1; xviii, 5, 4. 

m Matt, xiv, 3; Mark vi, 18; Luke iii, 19. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews: House of the Herods. 481 

said of some that John had risen from the dead." "And 
Herod [Antipas] said: John have I beheaded, but who is this 
of whom I hear such things?" "This is John 

§331. Jesus 

the Baptist; he is risen from the dead, and there- and 
fore mighty works do show forth themselves n ipa8# 
in him." 89 Jesus said of Antipas : "Go ye and tell that fox, 
Behold I cast out devils, and I do cures to-day and to-morrow, 
and the third day I shall be perfected." 90 

During the trial of Christ before Pilate, Herod Antipas 
was at Jerusalem. When Pilate came to understand that 
Jesus was from Galilee, the territory and realm of Antipas, " he 
sent him to Herod" as belonging to his jurisdiction. "And 
when Herod saw him, he was exceedingly glad; for he was 
desirous to see him of a long season, because he had heard many 
things of him, and hoped to see some miracle done by him." 
But when Christ declined to answer any questions of curiosity 
for Herod's gratification, the tetrarch was offended, and "Herod 
with his men of war set him at naught, and mocked him, and 
arrayed him in a gorgeous robe, and sent him again to Pilate. 
And the same day Pilate and Herod were made friends to- 
gether ; for before, they were at enmity between themselves." 91 
This is the last glimpse we have of Herod Antipas in the his- 
torical New Testament. When he was deposed and banished, 
as already cited, the second generation of the rulers of the 
house of the Herods passed out of history. 

III. The Third Generation of the Herods. 
HEROD AGRIPPA I (A. D. 37-44). 
Prince Agrippa was the son of Aristobulus and Bernice, 
and grandson of Herod the Great. He was born 
B. C. 10, and died A. D. 44. He was the child Lifeas* 8 
of two first-cousins, and he was himself married aPrinc e- 
to his own cousin, the daughter of an aunt, who again mar- 
ried an uncle. 92 Josephus calls him "Agrippa" and "Agrippa 

ss Matt, xiv, 2, 10; Luke ix,7 , 9. » Luke xiii, 32. 

«Luke xxiii, 6-12; comp. Acts lv, 27. « Wars, i, 28, 1. 



482 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

the Great;" 93 but in the New Testament he is known only by 
the surname " Herod," or " Herod the king." He was educated 
at Rome, as were most of the Herodian princes. He grew up 
to be a young man of gracious manners, of kindly spirit usually, 
with great powers of eloquence, and quite vain withal. In 
religion, Agrippa was a zealous rather than a devout Jew, 94 at- 
tentive to the "tithe of mint, and anise, and cummin," but 
neglectful of "the weightier matters of the law — judgment, 
mercy, and truth." He seems to have had much personal mag- 
netism, and was keenly alive to popularity. 95 At Eome, 
Agrippa formed a warm friendship with Prince Caius ( Gaius) 
Caligula who was heir-apparent to the imperial throne; a 
friendship which subsequently turned greatly to the advantage 
of Agrippa. 

A surprise of fortune arose out of this intimacy. As these 

two friends were riding out together in a chariot one day, 

Eutychus, a freedman, was charioteer. In the 

§333. Agrippa J ' ' 

and course of confidential conversation, Agrippa dra- 

matically stretched out his hands and said to 
Caligula that he wished that old Tiberius would die, that 
Caligula might assume the purple and the crown. The freed- 
man, overhearing the remark, reported it to his master, the 
Emperor Tiberius, who at once ordered Agrippa put in chains 
and incarcerated in prison. The order was executed, Agrippa 
still wearing his princly robe among the criminals of the State. 
This humiliation was endured by Agrippa about six months, 
when Tiberius died, and Caligula immediately succeeded him 
as emperor. Soon after the imperial funeral, Agrippa was 
summoned to appear at the imperial palace of Caligula. Hav- 
ing shaved and changed his robe, he presented himself before 
the emperor, his friend, who at once 

"Proceeded to put a diadem upon Agrippa's head, and appointed 
him to be a king of the tetrarchy of [his uncle] Philip;" "also . . . 
changed his iron chain for a gold one of equal weight/' which he hung 

^Ant. xvii, 2, 2; xviii, 5, 4. ^lb. xix,6, 1, 2; xix, 7, 3. 95 Acts xii, 1-8. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews : House of the Herods. 483 

about Agrippa's neck. And Agrippa afterwards " hung it up within the 
limits of the temple at the treasury [at Jerusalem] that it might be a 
memorial of the severe fate he had lain under, ... a demonstration 
how the greatest prosperity may have a fall, and that God sometimes 
raises what is fallen down ; ... for this chain thus dedicated, af- 
forded a document to all men that King Agrippa had once been bound 
in a chain for a small cause, but recovered his former dignity, and was 
advanced to be a more illustrious king." % The Senate also gave him the 
honorary position of praetor. 

In the second year of Caligula's reign, Agrippa requested 
leave of the emperor to return home to Palestine and take 
possession of his kingdom. Permission was . 

granted, and Agrippa sailed on the Mediterranean and 

in the usual course by way of Alexandria in oya y * 
Egypt. At this time the Jews and Greeks of the city were in 
unpleasant relations with each other. When the Greeks saw 
this new Jewish king, accompanied by his body-guard, exploit- 
ing much gold and silver, they mocked his royalty with mean- 
est insults. They engaged a naked idiot boy, named Carabas, 
who was the butt of the street boys, placed on his head a crown 
of paper, clothed him in mat-cloth, and, with a stick in his 
hand to represent a scepter, and with a body-guard composed 
of the gamins of the city, they derided the new king on the 
stage. Not so, however, at his home ; for when Agrippa reached 
his own subjects in Palestine, the Jews were astonished to see 
him returning with all the honors of royalty, and received him 
with every evidence of satisfaction. 

In accordance with his promise in taking leave of the 
emperor at the Capital, Agrippa, having organized and estab- 
lished his kingdom, returned to the imperial citv. 

& ' . . J §335. Returns 

It was about the time that Caligula developed to 

unmistakable signs of incipient insanity, demand- 
ing that he should be universally deified throughout the empire 
and be adored as a god, and that all men should swear by his 
name. He filled his Jewish subjects with consternation and 
horror when he ordered Petronius from Syria to place a gilded 

**Ant. xviii, 6, 10, 11; xix, 6, 1. 



484 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

statue of the emperor in the Holy of Holies in the temple at 
Jerusalem, to be worshiped; for when they submitted to be- 
come subjects of the empire, they were guaranteed all their 
national and religious liberty and rights. An embassy com- 
posed of the principal men of Alexandria, with the eminent 
Philo at their head, went to Rome to protest and persuade 
Caligula to desist from such an inexpressible wrong. Caligula t 
refused them his presence, and bade Philo " begone." * Petro- 
nius marched an army to Jerusalem to compel submission. At 
Ptolemais, the Jews flocked by the ten thousand to petition 
the Syrian prefect not "to violate the laws of their fore- 
fathers ;" but, if he persisted in carrying out the imperial order, 
he should first kill them, and then do what he w^as resolved 
upon doing. Petronius, touched with their loyalty to their 
religious convictions, promised to write to the emperor in their 
behalf. 97 

Meantime Agrippa had reached Rome, and furnished, in 
honor of his friend Caligula, a magnificent banquet ; and when 
the emperor was full of wine, and Agrippa had drunk to his 
health, Caligula, under a generous impulse, proposed in re- 
turn, — 

" All that I have bestowed upon thee that may be called my gifts, is 
but little. Everything that may contribute to thy happiness shall be at 
thy service, and that cheerfully, and so far as my ability will reach" — 
" thinking that he would ask for some large country, or revenues of 
certain cities." "Agrippa replied: Since thou, my Lord, declarest 
such is thy readiness to grant that I am worthy of thy gifts, I will ask 
nothing relating to my own felicity, . . . but I desire somewhat 
which may make thee glorious for piety, . . . and may be for an 
honor to me among those that inquire about it, . . . that thou wilt 
no longer think of the dedication of that statue which thou hast ordered 
to be set up in the Jewish temple by Petronius." 98 

This appeal was successful. Nevertheless, Petronius, for 
having so far disobeyed the imperial command as to intercede 
against the order given him, which he failed to obey, was now 
ordered to commit suicide ; but the order was delayed at Rome 

*Flaccum, §§ 5, 8. w Ant. xviii, 8, 1-6. 98 i&. xviii, 8, 1-9. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews : House of the Herods. 485 

for a short time, and in the meantime Caligula died by the 
dagger of an assassin, a tribune named Chasrea, whom the 
emperor had outrageously insulted. This was in A. D. 41. 

The weak-minded Claudius, who had been the laughing- 
stock of the Roman court, now came to the front for the suc- 
cession. Through the friendly offices of Herod 

G . . J §336. Agrippa 

Agrippa I, who, with adroit diplomacy, used his and his 
influence with the Senate, this man was made s om ' 

emperor. His pre-eminent services were recognized " as am- 
bassador to the Senate," and to the soldiers. As his return for 
his elevation to the imperial succession in the house of the 
Caesars and the empire of the world, Josephus again states 
that — 

" Claudius confirmed the kingdom of Agrippa which Caius [Caligula] 
had given him, and therein commended the king highly. He also made 
an addition to it of all that country over which Herod [the Great], who, 
was his grandfather, had reigned ; that is, Judaea and Samaria." " More- 
over, he bestowed on Agrippa his whole paternal kingdom immediately, 
and, besides, added to it those countries that had been given by Augustus 
to Herod [Philip II] ; namely, Trachonitis and Auranitis, and still, be- 
sides these, the kingdom which was called the kingdom of Lysanias. 
This gift he declared to the people by a decree, but ordered the magis- 
trates to have the donation engraven on tables of brass, and to be set 
up in the Capital." " 

Such in brief is the story of the attainment of the crown 
and kingdom of his grandfather, Herod the Great, by Herod 
Agrippa I. But he was made to feel that, after all, his do- 
minion was but a dependency upon the empire which domi- 
nated the nations which it included. Being of Idumaean origin, 
it is related that on one occasion, at the Feast of the Taber- 
nacles, the lesson of the Law for the day was read: "Thou 
shalt in any wise set him king over thee whom the Lord thy 
God shalt choose. . . . Thou mayest not set a stranger 
over thee which is not thy brother." Kemembering that he 
was of foreign stock, and so recognized by his brethren, though 
the Idumaeans had been Jews for more than a hundred years, 

*Ant. xix, 5, 1 ; Wars, ii, 11, 5 



486 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

he burst into tears before them all ; and the people sympathiz- 
ingly said : " Fear not, Agrippa, thou art our brother." For 
the Law also required : " Thou shalt not abhor the Edomite, 
for he is thy brother. . . . The children that are begotten 
of them shall enter into the congregation of the Lord, in their 
third generation." Agrippa's case met these conditions, and 
he was therefore entitled to the proposed consideration. 100 

Agrippa I made his residence mostly at Jerusalem, and 
commenced building impregnable walls to fortify the city. 
But Marsus Yibius, now prefect of Syria, ordered its discon- 
tinuance on the mere ground of his suspicion. The king, like 
all the Herods, was fond of ostentatious displays. 101 He had once 
invited a number of friends, who were petty kings contiguous 
to his own realm, to be his guests and enjoy his hospitality at 
the city of Tiberias, where royal spectacles were to be wit- 
nessed. Yibius came also from Syria. Agrippa and the five 
kings thought to do him honor, and went forth in a chariot 
about seven furlongs to meet the prefect. But Yibius, being 
again suspicious of the real intent of this gathering, made an 
affront to every one assembled, by peremptorily ordering the 
five kings to proceed at once and quietly to their respective 
homes. 102 

There is numismatic evidence in existence of this sovereign's 
reign, which completes the historicity of his kingdon. It con- 
sists of a coin struck at Caesarea by Herod Agrippa, which 
reads : 

Obverse : Agrippa the Great, Lover of Caesar. 
Eeverse : Csesar-on-Port-Sebastos.* 

There are two points of contact between the Evangelist 
Luke and the historian Josephus in their narratives, and two 
points of unpremeditated coincidence. These relate to the 

*Obv.: BASIAETS MErAS ArPIIIIIA <i>IA0KAI2EP. Rev.: KAISEP H 
2EBA2T12 AIMENI. He^ao-To? (Sebastos) was the standing Greek word for 
Augustus, a title assumed by several emperors; e. g., Acts xxv, 21, 25. " Cumanus 
took one troop of horsemen, called the troop of Sebaste, out of Ccesarea:' 1 ( Wars, ii, 12, 5.) 

looDeut.xvii, 15; xxiii, 7, 8. ™Ant.xix, 7, 2,5. «» lb. xix, 8, 1. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews : House of the Herods. 487 

kingship and the death of Herod Agrippa I. Luke's state- 
ment is to the effect that "Herod the King" afflicted the 
Church, beheaded James, brother of John, and onm . 

' ' § 337. Agrippa I 

imprisoned Peter, "because he saw it pleased and 

the Jews." The record of the story is : 

" Now about this time Herod the king put forth his hands to afflict 
certain of the Church. And he killed James the brother of John with 
the sword. And when he saw that it pleased the Jews, he proceeded to 
seize Peter also, . . . intending after the Passover to bring him 
forth to the people, . . . but prayer was made earnestly of the 
Church for him/' 103 

JSTow, the beheading of James is accordant with the Talmud 
in the Mishna: "The ordinance of putting to death by the 
sword is as follows : The man's head is cut off with a sword, as 
is accustomed to be done by royal command.'''' m The giving to 
Herod Agrippa I the title of king, with the implication of 
royalty, is absolutely and historically correct ; but it would be 
correct only for the brief period of three years ; namely, A. D. 
41-44. There never had been a king ruling in royalty over 
Judaea during the forty years previously, and never since those 
three years ; and these years were the last of the life of Herod 
Agrippa I, called also " Agrippa the Great," m the grandson of 
Herod the Great, who was king of all the land of Palestine 
from 37 to 4 B. C. 

Agrippa, his deputies, and other dignitaries of his kingdom, 
were assembled at Caesarea, at the seaside, to celebrate the 

games at a festival, and to offer vows for the 

• o -^ ^ § 33a The 

safety and prosperity of the Emperor Claudius. Death of 

Early in the morning of the second day of tne s^pp 3, 

celebration, King Agrippa presented himself to the people clad 

"in a garment made wholly of silver and of a texture truly 

wonderful." Josephus says that when the sun's rays touched 

his dress, the reflections shone out with amazing splendor. 

The people shouted "that he was a god," and "the king did 

io« Acts xii. 104 Professor Lumby's note, in loco. 105 Ant. xvii, 2, 2; xviii, 5, 4. 



488 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

neither rebuke them nor reject their impious flattery." After 
five days " he departed this life, being in the fifty-fourth year 
of his age." 106 Luke, upon the other hand, says of King 
Agrippa : 

" He went down from Judsea to Csesarea, and tarried there. . . . 
And upon a set day Herod arrayed himself in royal apparel and sat on 
the throne, and made an oration unto them ; and the people shouted 
saying, The voice of a god, and not of a man. And immediately an 
angel of the Lord smote him, because he gave not God the glory ; and he 
was eaten of worms, and gave up the ghost." 107 

The points of accordance between these two independent 
writers is something remarkable. They agree in] many par- 
ticulars, and conflict in none ; and what one in brevity omits, 
the other supplies in matters of detail. Josephus was writing 
an historical account of Herod Agrippa I, but Luke was writ- 
ing an account of the persecution of the Church, and incident- 
ally refers to Agrippa' s death. Accordingly, Luke's reference 
is the briefer, yet sufficiently full to be germane to the end 
had in view. An analysis of the two writings yields some in- 
teresting parallels of mutual confirmation. Both authors 
mention that Agrippa went to Csesarea, where he spent some 
time. Josephus relates that it was a festival occasion, when 
games were exhibited in honor of Caesar, which circumstances 
Luke naturally omits ; Luke, on the other hand, relates that 
"Agrippa sat on his throne and made an oration unto them," 
circumstances which Josephus omits to mention. Luke indi- 
cates that in the public occasion there was "a set day" when 
Agrippa appeared before the people; Josephus says that it 
was on the "second day when he appeared in the theater" to 
the multitude. Luke makes mention of a large assembly of 
"the people," whom Agrippa addressed; Josephus explains 
that there was a gathering of " the principal persons of dig- 
nity throughout the province." Luke says that " Herod arrayed 
himself in royal apparel ;" while Josephus describes his robes 
as " made wholly of silver and of a contexture truly wonder- 

io« lb. xix, 8, 2. 107 Acts xii, 9, 21-23. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews: House of the Herods. 489 

ful." Luke says that the effect of this surprising spectacle 
was such that the "people shouted;" Joseph us says that the 
king's appearance was " so resplendent as to spread a horror 
[awe] over those" that beheld it. Luke says that they cried 
out, " The voice of a god, and not of a man ;" Josephus says 
that they cried out, one in one place and another from another, 
"He is a god." Luke implies that the king accepted their 
homage "because he gave not God the glory;" Josephus says 
that "he did not rebuke them, nor reject their impious 
flattery." Luke says that he was smitten of an angel "and 
gave up the ghost;" Josephus says that "after five days he 
departed this life." Josephus, in general terms as an historian, 
says that Agrippa died from "a pain in his belly;" but Luke, 
as a careful physician, says that "he was eaten of worms." 
What two witnesses in any court giving independent testi- 
mony would agree more perfectly in the recital of facts? 
And what is most remarkable in these descriptions is not the 
points of difference, but the points of agreement between 
them. Josephus the historian therefore, again and in an 
extraordinary manner, confirms the historicity of the Evangel- 
ist Luke. 

TV. Fourth Generation of the Herods. 
HEROD AGRIPPA II (52-70 A. D.) 

Considerable difficulty has been experienced in distinguish- 
ing the father and son, as they bear exactly the same name, 
and both were Jewish kings. Attention, there- 

b ' §339. The Two 

fore, is drawn to the fact that, m both sacred Agrippas 

j i i • j. -I x Distinguished. 

and secular history, these two personages are 
known by different appellations. Outside the Scripture the 
elder is called Herod Agrippa I, and the younger, Herod 
Agrippa II. But in the New Testament the father is named 
either " Herod," as he is repeatedly called in a single chapter 
or "Herod the king;" 108 whereas the son, in contradistinction 

108 Acts xii, 1,6, 11, 19-21. 



490 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

from his father, is called either "Agrippa," or "King 
Agrippa." 109 Both were kings, and were known by the 
same name ; but they did not reign at the same time, or rule 
the same realm. Herod Agrippa I, as was Herod the Great his 
grandfather, was king of all Palestine during A. D. 41-44 
and, later, Herod Agrippa II was king of about one-third of 
that country lying in the northeast, embracing that region for_ 
merly known as the tetrarchies of Philip and Lysanias, which 
he ruled A. D. 52-70. As to Scriptural incidents associated 
with each, it was Herod Agrippa I who beheaded James, the 
brother of John, and imprisoned Peter whom the angel deliv- 
ered by night; 110 but it was Herod Agrippa II who was present 
to hear the masterly and courtly address of Paul at Caesarea 
whom the apostle mentions as "king" and "King Agrippa," 
as does also Luke when narrating the same occasion. 111 Herod 
Agrippa I died at Caesarea in A. D. 44, after delivering an 
oration in the theater ; and Herod Agrippa II died at Rome 
in private life, in A. D. 100, in the third year of Trajan's 
reign. 

The great grandson of Herod the Great, and son of Herod 

Agrippa I, was but seventeen years of age when the father 

n m died. 112 He was born in A. D. 27, and at the 

§ 340. The ' 

Youth of death of his father was residing at Rome, re- 
grippa ' ceiving his education under the patronage of 
the emperor. "Now Agrippa the son of the deceased was at 
Rome, and brought up with Claudius Caesar." This emperor 
at first contemplated placing young Agrippa at once upon his 
father's throne to rule all Palestine ; but, better counsels pre- 
vailing, he concluded that it would be "a dangerous experi- 
ment for so very young a man," who was without experience, 
to undertake to govern " so large a kingdom." " So Claudius 
made the country a Roman province, and sent Cuspius Fadus 
to be procurator of Judaea and of the entire kingdom." m 

109 Acts xxv, 22, 23, 26 ; xxvi, 27, 28, 32. «o Acts xii, 1-3. 

i"76. xxvi, 1, 2, 7, 19, 27; xxv, 13, 22-24, 26; xxvl, 28, 32. 
»» Ant. xlx. 9, 1. 11 3 lb. xix, 9, 2; Wars, ii, 12, 1. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews : House of the Herods. 491 

When his uncle Herod, King of Chalcis, died in A. D. 48, 
young Agrippa had attained the twenty-first year of his age. 
Thereupon "Claudius set Agrippa, the son of . 

Agrippa, over his uncle's kingdom." "But he n and 

took from him Chalcis when he had governed 
thereof four years," and "removed Agrippa [II] from Chalcis 
to a greater kingdom," embracing the former tetrarchies of 
Philip and Lysanias, with considerable additions. 114 All the 
remainder of his father's kingdom continued as a Roman 
province until the destruction of the Jewish nation in A. D. 
70. Herod Agrippa II was now made superintendent of the 
temple at Jerusalem, and manager of its treasury, with fulj 
power to remove the high priests from office at pleasure, an 
authority which he was often pleased to exercise, as also did 
his uncle Herod of Chalcis before him. 115 When Nero's acces- 
sion to the throne of the empire had been effected, he made 
an imperial gift to his dominions of several cities and fourteen 
villages. 116 Agrippa II thereupon had a coin struck in honor 
of Nero bearing the following representation : 

Obverse: Nero Caesar; with the head of Nero laureated. 
Eeverse : By King Agrippa, Neronias ; within an olive crown.* 

That is, Csesarea Philippi being the capital of his kingdom, 
Herod Agrippa II re-named the city Neronias in honor of 
Nero. Josephus says: "About this time it was that King 
Agrippa built Caesarea Philippi larger than before, and in 
honor of Nero named it Neronias." 117 But the subjects of the 
younger Agrippa regarded him as a cold-blooded and arbitrary 
man, and did not entertain for him the love which they had 

*Obv.: NEPftN KAI. Rev.: EIII BASIAE. ArPIIin. NEPiWIE. 

In June, 1891, there was discovered in Si'a, Hauran, near Damascus, a mon- 
umental inscription in Greek, in honor of Agrippa II, which reads: BA2IAETS 
MErAS 3>IAOKAIEAP ETSEBHS KAI <£IA0PQMAI02="Great King, Lover-of- 
Csesar, devout, Lover-of-Rome. " ( See George Adam Smith's Historical Geogra- 
phy of the Holy Land.") 

u* Ant. xx, 7, 1 ; Wars, ii, 12, 8. "5 Ant. xx, 1, 3 ; xx, 8, 8. 

lie lb. xx, 8, 4. H7 lb. xx, 9, 4. 



492 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

for his father; 118 yet he was recognized as well skilled in all 
matters relating to the Jewish law. 119 

It is now in place to indicate the points of concurrence be- 
tween sacred and secular history touching the times and 
a n a P erson °^ Herod Agrippa II, the last of the rulers 

ii and the in the house of the Herods. It is mentioned in 
the Acts of the Apostles that there was a special 
occasion and assembly at Caesarea-by-the-Sea. Upon the ar- 
rival of Festus from Rome at Caesarea, the capital of provincial 
Judaea, to assume the functions of his office as procurator, 
Agrippa came hither to extend his royal salutations and con- 
gratulations to Festus, and witness his advancement to place 
and power in the Roman government. 120 The occasion was 
celebrated with much circumstance of pomp and display, of 
both a civic and military character. That, however, which 
seems to have centralized all interests, was a man of great dis- 
tinction who was a prisoner in chains on Festus' s hands, con- 
cerning the proper disposition of whom the new procurator 
desired the counsel of King Agrippa II. The king himself had 
no authority in Caesarea. His mission was one of courtesy, and 
his participation in the occasion was merely advisory. He had 
heard much respecting the distinguished prisoner now in 
chains, and was curious to see and hear his eloquent utterances. 
Accordingly the Apostle Paul was brought forth at Caesarea 
before the brilliant assembly of the dignitaries of the province, 
and Herod Agrippa II and his sister, the princess Bernice, and 
invited by the king to make a defense of his Christian faith. 
Luke says: "Now when certain days were passed, Agrippa 
the king and Bernice arrived at Caesarea, and saluted Festus." m 

This visit in company with Bernice has been called in ques- 
tion on the score of its historicity as being very unusual ; but 
it finds corroboration in that it was the custom of Agrippa to 
make visits of courtesy and ceremony on other such occasions. 
For in the year 64 he went to Beirut to salute Gessius Florus, 

"8 Ant. xx, 8, 11 ; xx, 9, 4. iw Acts xxvi, 3. 

120 Acts xxv, 13. ,21 lb. xxv, 13, and xxvl. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews : House of the Herods. 493 

when he assumed the procuratorship of Judaea ; and again in 
66, when Tiberius Alexander became prefect of Alexandria. 
With regard to both these occasions, Josephus says he went 
" to Berytus with the intention of meeting Gessius, the Roman 
governor of Judaea." 122 Also, "about this time King Agrippa 
[the II] was going to Alexandria to congratulate Alexander 
upon his having obtained the government of Egypt from 
Nero." m In both instances King Agrippa was accompanied 
by his sister Bernice. 

King Herod Agrippa II was the last reigning prince of the 
house of the Herods. In the closing part of the sixth Christian 
decade, when the Jews made their final revolt against the 
Roman Empire, Agrippa urged the Jews against such pro- 
cedure; and when the issue was fully determined upon, the 
king joined his royal forces against his own subjects. Vespasian 
first made the invasion of Palestine with the imperial army ; 
but being called to Rome after being proclaimed emperor, he 
transferred the army to his son Titus to complete the campaign 
and subjugation of the Jews. In the capture of Jerusalem in 
the year 70, the Jewish nation was destroyed, the temple was 
burned, and the survivors were expatriated. King Agrippa's 
kingdom came to an end. 

IY. Princesses of the House of Herod. 
HERODIAS— BERNICE— DRUSILLA. 
These Jewish princesses were not themselves Jewish rulers, 
but were married to Jewish rulers. By birth they belonged 
to the roval house of the Herods. In the histor- 

J §343. The 

ical part of the New Testament these princesses Herodian 
are named as associated with specific incidents 
the mention of which justifies an inquiry as to the historicity 
of their existence and character. The investigation will com- 
plete the evidence furnished respecting the royal house of the 
Herods, and yield an added interest and evidence to the an- 
tiquity and authenticity of the sacred writings. 

«» Life of Josephus, § 11. 123 Wars, ii, 15, 1. 



494 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

I. HERODIAS. 
Herodias was granddaughter of Herod the Great and sister 
of Herod Agrippa I. She first married Herod Philip I, her 
O o„„ x* ^ fu U uncle, and while he was still living she 

g 344. Herodias t ' & 

and the eloped with her husband's half-brother, Herod 
Antipas, the tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea, 
while his wife was yet alive. 124 The first two Gospels mention 
" the daughter of Herodias " m who danced before the festive 
party of nobles when celebrating Antipas's birthday, but do 
not mention her name, or say that she was the daughter of 
Herod Philip I. Josephus witnesses that a daughter was born 
of the first marriage with Philip I, whose name was Salome, 136 
who afterwards became the wife of Herod Philip II, the te- 
trarch. He also states that Herodias, being a Jewess with a 
child born to the first marriage, with the Jews, was a bar to a 
second legal marriage. 127 Her whole conduct in this matter of 
elopement was an aggravation to the Jews, particularly unto 
John the Baptist, the pure and rugged reformer ; and the in- 
tense indignation aroused was deepened by the fact that He- 
rodias and Antipas were both members of the royal family ; 
and their offense was " sin in high places," the more notorious 
in that Antipas was conspicuously a ruler of the Jews, who 
thus defiantly violated the Jewish laws. 

The scandalous conduct of these infamous persons is cited 
in all the Synoptic Gospels ; as also the reproof administered 
to them by John the Baptist for their guilty misconduct. 
Mark mentions the occasion calling for John's strictures, 
which was "for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip's 
wife ; for he married her. For John said unto Herod, It is 
not lawful for thee to have thy brother's wifeP Matthew also 
reports the same circumstance in nearly the same words. 
Luke's testimony is briefer and broader: "But Herod the 
tetrarch being reproved by him for Herodias, his brother 
Philip's wife, and for all the things which Herod had done." 128 

™Ant. xviii, 5, 1. i2&Matt. x iv, 6; Mark vi, 22. ™ Ant. xvlii, 5, 4. 

127 Matt, xiv, 4; Deut. xxv, 5; Levit. xviii, 16; xx, 21. 

128 Matt. xiv. 1-14; Mark vi, 14-29; Luke iii, 19, 20. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews: House of the Herods. 495 

The Synoptic Gospels are in entire accordance with each 
other in accounting for the origin of the Baptist's reproof of 
Herod Antipas, the circumstance which led up 

1 r §345. Josephus 

to John's imprisonment and death. The inde- and the 
pendent testimony of Josephus is at once an un- van ^ e 
designed but significant coincidence in history, remarkably 
corroborative of the story of the criminal and incestuous mar- 
riage of these parties in high life. For Josephus not only 
fully confirms,, but explains in detail the story of the elope- 
ment, by giving a circumstantial account of how it was 
brought about. He says nothing, and probably knew noth- 
ing, respecting the reproof administered to Antipas as the 
ground for the tetrarch's punishing the Baptist with imprison- 
ment and death. Either in ignorance or in suppression of the 
fact, Josephus omits mentioning it, but attributes the defeat 
of Herod's army by the Arabian prince, Herod's first father- 
in-law, as a just judgment of God for having beheaded John. 129 

II. BERNICE. 
This princess was the eldest daughter of King Herod 
Agrippa I, the sister of King Herod Agrippa II, and the wife 
of that Herod who was the king of Chalcis, 

° ' §346. Bernice 

" who was both her husband and her uncle." and her 
Connected with royalty in all directions by blood 
and marriage, she was sometimes called a "queen," although 
she never wore a crown. She is described as a woman of rare 
personal beauty. Tacitus remarks, "Queen Bernice at that 
time in the bloom of youth and beauty." 130 Her husband died 
in the year 48, when she was but twenty years of age. Ac- 
cording to the testimonies of the historians of those times, she 
retrograded in character, and acquired a bad fame in her rela- 
tions with different personages — Vespasian, Titus, and even 
with her own brother Agrippa II. 131 One citation in proof is 
sufficient. Josephus says of Bernice : 

" She lived a widow a long time after the death of Herod, who was 
both her hu sband and her uncle. But when the report went out that 

129 Ant. xviii, 5, 1, 2. ™ Hist, ii, 81. 

™ Life of Josephus, § 11; Tacitus, Hist. 11, 81; Sueton. Claudius, 28. 
32 



496 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ghe had criminal intercourse with her brother, she persuaded Polemo, 
who was king of Oilicia, to be circumcised, and to marry her, as sup- 
posing that, by this means, she would prove these calumnies to be false ; 
and Polemo was prevailed upon, and that chiefly on account of her riches. 
Yet did not this matrimony endure long, but Bernice left Polemo," 132 
and is supposed to have returned to the house of her brother. 

That Bernice was accustomed to accompany her brother 

on public occasions on visits of salutations has been already 

considered. It remains to be remarked that she 

§347. Bernice . ..,,». 

and exerted no little influence on political affairs. 

This was illustrated when the two went together 
to Jerusalem, and succeeded for a while in quieting the spirit 
of rebellion and war among the Jews, who had been terribly 
exasperated by the illegal procedures and cruelties of the 
Koman procurator Floras. Having placed Bernice in a 
gallery overlooking the multitudes, Agrippa made an address 
with a powerful appeal; and "when Agrippa had thus spoken, 
both he and his sister wept, and by their tears repressed a 
great deal of the violence of the people." m When she went 
to Csesarea with King Agrippa, the princess was thirty-two 
years old, and as she sat at King Agrippa' s side, "blazing 
with all her jewels," they listened to the apostle's powerful 
address, which seems to have greatly moved both Festus the 
procurator and King Agrippa, his royal guest. 134 

III. DRUSILLA. 

Princess Brasilia was the youngest of three daughters of 

Herod Agrippa I, and was, of course, the sister of Agrippa II 

and Bernice. 135 She was but six years old when 

§348. Drusilla J 

and her her royal father died, in A. D. 44. This princess 
Marriage. wag a qqIq^^q^ beauty, and, being a Jewess, 
consented to marriage with Azizus, King of Edessa, upon the 
express condition of his complying with the required cere- 
mony of becoming a Jew. 136 Josephus relates the particulars : 

" While Felix was procurator of Judsea he saw Drusilla and fell in 
™Ant. xx, 7, 3; comp. Tacitus, Hist, ii, 81; Sue ton. Titus, vii, and note; 
Juvenal, Satires, vi, 155-157. 

188 Wars, ii, 16, 1-5. 134 See $342. 

135 Ant. xviii. 5. 4. m Ib. xx, 7, 1, 2. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews : House of the Herods. 497 

love with her ; for she did indeed exceed all other women in beauty ; 
and he sent to her a person whose name was Simon, one of his friends ; 
a Jew he was and by birth a Cypriot [i. e., of Cyprus], and one who pre- 
tended to be a magician ; and he endeavored to persuade her to forsake 
her husband and marry him ; and promised that if she would not refuse 
him, he would make her a happy woman. Accordingly she acted ill, 
and because she was desirous to avoid her sister Bernice's envy [who 
was ten years older than herself] , for she was very ill treated by her on 
account of her beauty, was prevailed upon to transgress the laws of her 
forefathers and marry Felix. And when he had a son by her, he named 
him Agrippa." 137 The mother and son perished in the eruption of 
Mount Vesuvius in the first year of the reign of Titus, A. D. 79. 

As Bernice afterward accompanied Agrippa to Cgesarea, so 
now Drusilla went with her husband Felix to the same city, 
curious to see and hear the famous prisoner, the 

, . ' §349. Drusilla 

Apostle Paul, whose strange history, lofty per- and the 

sonality, and marvelous powers of eloquence, had Scriptures - 

made such a deep impression on all the great community of 

friends and foes. Luke records that — 

" After certain days, Felix came with Drusilla his own wife who was 
a Jewess, and sent for Paul and heard him concerning the faith in 
Christ Jesus. And as he reasoned of righteousness and temperance 
and a judgment to come, Felix was terrified, and answered: Go thy way 
for this time ; when I have a convenient season, I will call thee unto 
me. He hoped withal that money would be given him of Paul [as 
bribery to purchase his personal freedom]. But when two years were 
fulfilled, . . . desiring to gain favor with the Jews, Felix left Paul 
in bonds." 138 

It is important to keep in sight in this connection the 
origin and character of Felix, the procurator of Judaea 
History represents him as once a slave in Rome, 

J r §350. Felix 

that he had been freed and raised to position and ' her 

power by the weak-minded Claudius, 139 and that Husband - 

in his government he evinced all the low instincts of a slave # 

Dr. Farrar says that — 

"Felix had been a slave, in the vilest of all positions, in the vilest 
of all epochs, in the vilest of all cities." 140 Tacitus says: "Antonius 
Felix exercised the prerogatives of a king with the spirit of a slave, riot- 
ing in cruelty and licentiousness" 141 — "who supposed he might perpe- 

™Ant. xx, 7, 2. iss Acts xxiv, 24-27. ™Ant. xx, 7. 1. 

i*> Life and Work of Paul, ii, 341. i« Hist, v, 9 



498 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

trate with impunity every kind of villainy." 142 Suetonius says: "He 
became in consequence of his elevation the husband of three queens." 143 

At the time Felix left Paul in bonds at Csesarea, he had 
been recalled to Eome by Nero to answer for the cruelties and 
crimes of his administration in Judsea. 

In traversing the evidence for the existence and authority 
of the Jewish rulers of the house of the Herods and the prin- 
§351 Tne cesses, in all the historical details of persons, 
Review. places, and times, we have the statements prin- 
cipally of two independent writers. They were the contem- 
poraries of each other, and evidently the contemporaries of 
the events which they narrate. The one was a Christian 
evangelist, the other a Jewish historian; the one a friend, and 
the other an adversary of Christianity. Both were residents 
in the land whose events and incidents they describe Each 
wrote in entire freedom of mind, and without any knowledge 
of the other, yet their accordancy and accuracy, even to the 
minutest detail, is something remarkable. Can two other 
writers of equal antiquity be named who parallel each other 
in as many details? Now, it is obvious that no writer of a 
later date could have mentioned, often casually, occurrences 
of special character, with such sharpness of circumstance, 
under such frequency of governmental change in the political 
geography of the land, in part and again in whole, involving 
such complications without falling into errors, as did Tacitus, 
Celsus, and Dion Cassius, who lived and wrote somewhat later.* 
The exact relation of these rulers to the people as subjects, 
and to the country as realms, are distinctly and accurately 
stated, but incidentally to another end, by Luke ; for he was 
merely writing biographical memoirs touching the beginnings 
of Christianity, while Josephus was writing a methodical 

* Tacitus substantially dates the death of Agrippa I in 49 instead of 44 
{Annals xii, 23) ; Celsus represents that it was " Herod the tetrarch," instead of 
Herod the Great, who " sent and slew all the infants, instead of all the male children, 
born about the same time" {Orig. contra Cels.i, 58); and Dion Cassius confuses 
and confounds the rulers of the Herodian family (Hist, of Borne, chapters 49, 
53, 55, and 60). 

^Annals, xii, 54. 143 Claudius, 28. 



Jewish Rulers of the Jews : House of the Heeods. 499 

history of the Jewish nation. The Evangelist gives certain 
main facts; and every essential particular is confirmed by 
Josephus, whether the ruler was an ethnarch, a tetrarch, or 
king over a part or the whole of Palestine ; or whether one of 
the several Eoman procurators who ruled in his time was in 
power over a province. Josephus both corroborates and sup- 
plements Luke's record of persons and occurrences. Luke's 
notices are mostly of personages and events associated with 
them as pivotal occasions in the early history of the Christian 
Church ; while Josephus gives the circumstances in detail as 
connected with the Jewish nation. Josephus, accordingly, is 
quite full in his particularizations respecting him who was the 
ruler, when he began to rule, the boundaries of his territory, 
the contentment or contention of his subjects, the principal 
events occurring under his government, together with some 
account of the end of his government, whether recalled, de- 
posed, or by death, and what became of the territory during 
those first fifty years of the Christian era. Besides this con- 
firmation on the part of Josephus, as well as by others — 
as Tacitus, Suetonius, and Dion Cassius at given points — there 
is the incontestable substantiation of Luke's statement by 
numismatic proof, bearing the images and superscriptions 
upon the several rulers' coins, struck when they were in 
power. It should be perfectly obvious that no spurious writer 
could possibly produce a belief favorable to such writing, or 
escape detection now as an impostor, if he wrote of events, 
rulers, and realms in that remarkably changeable period. Sci- 
entific investigation can neither demand nor supply better 
data in facts for historical induction than are to be found in 
these writings of the New Testament, related to this period. 
The same is true of the several Herodian princesses, whose 
names, character, and conduct have mention on the sacred 
page. There is no error in matters of fact in the record. 
Thus by all these minute details, so circumstantially but inci- 
dentally introduced by the Evangelist, the Book of Acts is 
shown to be strictly historical. 



500 



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Coins of the Several Herods. 



COINS OF THE SEVERAL HERODS. 



Fig. 1. Coin of Hebod the Great — King, B. C. 37-B. C. 4. 

The Obverse side or face of the coin represents a helmet with cheek- 
pieces, also a star above, and the censer of the High Priest. The star is 
supposed to refer to Herod's 
conquest of Jerusalem, and 
the censor borne on the Day 
of Atonement — the day Her- 
od won his final victory. 

The Reverse side bears 
the superscription : HPQAOT 
BA2IAE0S= [Money] of Her- 
od the King, and the monogram P, a contraction of Tpl\xa\Kog-=the value 
of the bronze coin. The legend L. T. indicates the third year of Herod's 
reign, when the coin was struck. 

Fig. 2. Coin of Herod Archelaus — Ethnarch, B. C. 4-A. D. 6. 

Obverse: HPfiAOT= [Money] of Herod. The 
device is a leaf and a cluster of grapes. 

Reverse: EONAPXOT=of the Ethnarch. The 
device is a helmet. 





Fig. 3. Coin of Herod Antipas — Tetrarch, B. C. 4-A. D. 39. 

Obverse: HPflAOT TETPAPXOT 
=of Herod the Tetrarch. The 
device is a palm-branch, and the 
legend L. Ar=33, i. e., A. D. 29. 

Reverse: TIBEPIA2=Tiberias, 
the capital of the Tetrarchy , writ- 
ten within a wreath ; the city 
built and named by Antipas in honor of the Emperor Tiberius. 




Fig. 4. Coin of Herod Philip II.— Tetrarch, B. C. 4-A. D. 34. 

Obverse : TIBEPIOS 2EBA2T0S 
KAI2AP=Tiberius, Sebastos [= Au- 
gustus] Caesar, whose image accom- 
panies the superscription. 

Reverse: <*>IAIIIIIOT TET[PAPXOT] 
=Philip the Tetrarch. The device 
is a temple between whose columns is the legend L. AZ=the year 37, for 
A. D. 33. 




Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 




Fig. 5. Coin op Herod Agrippa I. — King, A. D. 37-44. 

Obverse: BA2IAET2 MErAS ArPIIHIA2 <l>IA0KAI2AP=Agrippa the 

Great, King, Lover of Caesar. [See 
Josephus, Ant. xvii, 5, 1.] The head 
of Agrippa I. 

Reverse: KAI2APIA H IIP02 [Tft 
2EBA2TO] AIMENI=Csesarea-at-the 
Harbor of Sebaste= Augustus. The 
figure is that of Fortune holding the helm of a vessel, and also a cornu- 
copia. 

Fig. 6. Coin of Herod Agrippa II. — King, A. D. 50-100. 

Obverse: NEPflN KAI[2AP]=Nero Caesar 
[the Emperor], whose head accompanies the 
superscription. 

Reverse: EIII BA2IAE. AITOHI. NEPONIE 
= [Issued] by King Agrippa at Neronias 
(=Csesarea Philippi), renamed by him in honor of Nero about A. D. 
55, on receiving considerable accessions to his dominion. 




CHAPTER XVII. 

THE JEWISH NATION IN THE TIMES OF THE 
NEW TESTAMENT. 

I. The Condition of Jewish Society. 

1. Sectional Differences. 

2. Sectarian Differences. 

3. Racial Contentions. 

a) Spirit of Insubordination. 
/3) Disposition for Conspiracies. 
7) Immorality of Conduct. 
II. The Destruction of the Jewish Nation. 

1. False Messiahs and Impostors. 

2. Gospel unto all Nations. 

3. Beginning of Sorrows. 

4. Signs of Warning. 

5. Escape of the Christians. 

6. Retribution on that Generation. 

a) A Bank and Wall about Jerusalem. 
/S) City compassed round on Every Side. 
y) Tribulation such as never was or shall be. 

d) Children dashed to the Ground. 

e) Not one Stone left upon Another. 

The Sacrifices and Oblation cease. 
The Temple at Jerusalem burned. 
Jerusalem Itself made Desolate 
The Witness of the Infidels. 

III. They Shall Fall by the Edge of the Sword. 
Retribution upon that Generation. 
The Roman Triumphal and Monument. 
A Review. 
The Prediction. 
The Realization. 
The Advantages. 
501 



Chapter XVII. 

THE JEWISH NATION IN THE TIMES OF THE 
NEW TESTAMENT. 

§ 352. The Jewish Nation in the Times of the New Testament. 
Upon two foundations, the law of Nature and the law of Revelation, de- 
pend all human laws. — William Blackstone. 

There never was found, in any age of the world, either religion or law 
that did so highly exalt the public good as the Bible. — Francis 
Bacon. 

I find more sure marks of authenticity in the Bible than in any profane 
history whatever. — Isaac Newton. 

Young man, my advice to you is that you cultivate an acquaintance with 
truth, and a firm belief in the Holy Scriptures. This is your cer- 
tain interest. — Benjamin Franklin. 

Let us cling with a holy zeal to the Bible, and the Bible only, as the 
source of our religion. — Joseph Story. 

All human discoveries seem to be made only for the purpose of confirm- 
ing more and more strongly, the truths contained in the Sacred 
Scriptures. — Sir John Herschel. 

By proving the Record true, Science pronounces it Divine; for who 
could have correctly narrated the secrets of eternity but God him- 
self? The grand old Book of God still stands, and this old earth, 
the more its leaves are turned over and pondered, the more it will 
sustain and illustrate the Sacred Word. — Professor James D. Dana. 

It is impossible rightly to govern the world without God and the Bible. — 
George Washington. 

If we abide by the principles taught in the Bible, our country will go on 
prospering and to prosper. My heart has always assured me, and 
reassured me, that the Gospel of Jesus Christ must be a Divine 
reality. — Daniel Webster. 

Christ predicted the destruction of Jerusalem, the overthrow of the 
Jewish State, and the forfeiture of its rank and privilege as the 
seat of the worship of Jehovah. When the city stood in all its 
strength and splendor, he set the date of its downfall within the 
lifetime of the generation then on the stage. — Professor George 
P. Fisher. 

503 



504 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

For the nation and kingdom that will not serve Thee shall perish : yea, 
those nations shall be utterly wasted. — Isaiah. 

ARGUMENT. 
The condition of the Jewish nation in the time of Christ described with 
reference to its differences : Eacial, Sectional, and Sectarian. The 
morals of the people indicated as exampled in their spirit of in- 
subordination, conspiracies, and other immoral conduct. The 
utterances of Jesus Christ on the Mount of Olives, respecting Jeru- 
salem and the Jews, predicting, with exactness of circumstan- 
tiality, the destruction of the temple, and the overthrow of the 
nation and its religious institutions, which would be accompanied 
with untold miseries incurred by rulers and subjects alike within 
that generation, whose greatest crime consisted in their crucifixion 
of their own Messiah King-. 

As was foretold, false Messiahs arose and disappeared ; signs 
of warning of the approaching catastrophe were given and un- 
heeded ; the apostles escaped these afflictions, so that not a hair 
of their heads perished as they fled to the mountains. Then began 
the " beginning of sorrows," that "great tribulation, such as was 
not from the beginning of the world ; no, nor ever will be." This 
prediction literally fulfilled, in every detail given, by the conquer- 
ing Eomans under Titus in the Christian year 70. The Prediction, 
the Eealization, and the Advantages accruing to mankind, as seen 
in the Eetrospect of nineteen centuries. 

1. The Character and Condition of the Jews in the time of 

Jesus Christ. 

2. The Destruction of their Commonwealth, and the 

Wretchedness incurred. 

3. The Prophecy, the Eealization, and the Advantages to 

Mankind accruing. 

I. The Condition of the Jews. 

During the period when most of the New Testament was 
written, the Jews were one people in race, in religion, in in- 
stitutions, and in customs. For centuries the 

§353. A Nation ' 

and Jews had been set apart as the chosen people of 

ierarc y. q. 0( ^ through whom the world was to be blessed ; 
the recipients of God's promises, the repositories of his law, 
the exemplars of the only true religion on earth, through whom 
the Messianic Eedeemer was to descend for the salvation of 
mankind. The government of the nation, intended to be 
theocratic, was invested in a hierarchy located at Jerusalem, 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 505 

and known as the Great Sanhedrin. 1 It was both a legal and 
administrative Senate, called in the New Testament "the 
Council," and exercised great power over the people in Pales- 
tine who worshiped in the temple, and also exerted no little 
influence upon the Jews who were "the Dispersed" 2 abroad 
among the nations who worshiped in the synagogues. In the 
Talmud this body of men was styled " the House of Judgment" 3 
The national institution at Jerusalem was called "the Great 
Synagogue" in distinction from the numerous synagogues of 
less character throughout the country charged with the care 
of the local interests of the Jews in that community. 

Rabbinical writers refer the origin of this institution to 
the Seventy Elders chosen by Moses 4 for his assistance in the 
administration of the affairs of Israel in the 

§ 354. Organi- 

wilderness. But this rabbinical account of the zationofthe 
origin is quite probably mythical. The Sanhe- an e rm * 
drin was organized of scribes, and elders of the Church; in 
number seventy or seventy-one. The president of the body 
was called JVasi. 5 The vice-president was styled " the father 
of the House of Judgment" 6 who sat on the right hand of 
the president; and the next lower in rank was the "wise 
man" 1 who prepared on both sides the given case, and 
brought it before the Sanhedrin for trial. He sat on the left 
side of the president. There were also two secretaries or 
notaries, 8 one of whom recorded the reasons for acquittal, 
and the other recorded those for condemnation. The presi- 
dent, who in dignity represented the civil and religious inter- 
ests of the nation, sat on a platform, with the vice-president 
on his right hand, and the referee on his left. The notaries 
stood, one on the right, and the other on the left of the presi- 

^^TU ^"nnjD (<ruv^5/jtoj'=Sanhedrin), Tolmud, Sanhedr. i, 5, the supreme 
council. 

ajohnvii, 35. 3 pJV3 

4 Numb, xi, 16, 17 {Sanhedr. 1, 6). 
5 K"KU, a leader, in Christ's time the high priest. «»H W2 3K 

T | • - T 

7 DDn a sage. 8 yyin i-j£»D 



506 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

dent. Three rows of disciples sat before them. The members 
of the Sanhedrin — priests, elders, and scribes — were seated 
on low cushions, in a semi-circle according to age and learn- 
ing, so that all could be seen by the chief officers. 

The function of this Senate of wisdom and learning was 

legislative, judicial, and administrative. As early as B. C. 

47, when Herod the Great was vet but procura- 

§355. Function 7 „ 

of the tor of Galilee, he was summoned before the 

Sanhedrin because he had usurped the authority 
of that body by putting men to death; 9 a circumstance indi- 
cating that at that time they claimed and possessed the 
power of life and death. But when Archelaus was deposed 
from his ethnarchy and banished from Judaea, " Coponius, one 
of the equestrian order among the Bomans, was sent as a pro- 
curator, having the power of [life and] death put into his 
hands by Csesar." 10 The Jews claim that they relinquished 
this right, 11 but the claim is probably fictitious, for it was 
made a matter of law. To Pilate they openly confessed in ref- 
erence to Jesus: "It is not lawful for us to put any man to 
death." The Sanhedrin had the power to arrest a supposed 
criminal, and to try and condemn him as worthy of death; 
but they could not execute their own sentence upon him, 12 for 
the reason that they had been deprived of that power. The 
case of Stephen 13 was an illegal procedure, as was also the 
martyrdom of "James the Just," our Lord's brother. Prob- 
ably both were put to death during an interim between the 
death of Festus and the arrival of Albinus, when there was no 
procurator present in Judsea. 14 

The place where the Sanhedrin sat in deliberation is called 

in the Talmud Gazzith^ which was a hall supposed to be 

located near the southeast corner of one of 

§356. The Place 

of the the courts of the temple; but sometimes they 

met at the house of the high priest. 16 In the 

time of Christ's ministry the body of Sanhedrists was re- 

*Ant. xiv,9, 4. ™Wars, ii, 8, 1; Ant. xviii, 1, 1. "Tal. Abodah Zara, f. 8, 2. 

»2 Matt, xxvi, 66; John xviii, 81. 13 Acts vii. " Ant. xx, 9, 1, 2. 

w Sanhedr. x. * 6 Matt, xxvi, 3. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 507 

moved from the temple, and was located elsewhere on 
Mount Moriah; 17 and after the destruction of Jerusalem, the 
Sanhedrin met at Tiberias, on the west side of the Sea of 
Galilee. 18 

The references to the great Sanhedrin in the New Testa- 
ment are numerous. Before that body Jesus was indicted on 
several counts, for being a " false prophet," for 
uttering "blasphemy," and for "perverting the " hedrin an<T" 
nation." 19 John and Peter were arraigned as Testament 
false teachers; 20 and Paul as "a seditionist," 
"and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes ;" 21 while Ste- 
phen was charged with having spoken against the law of 
Moses and against the temple. 22 Paul was placed before the 
Sanhedrin by the Koman officer "to know the certainty 
whereof he was accused by the Jews," when Ananias the high 
priest ordered him to be smitten on the mouth with the 
iron heel of a shoe, as an act of supreme contempt for his 
having made a profession of conscientiousness respecting his 
life. 23 

By reason of the Babylonian captivity and the return of 
only two tribes, various distinctions arose among the Jews 
respecting their rights and mutual recognition, 
one ground of which was sectional differences. encesof 
The geograpical lines of Palestine limited the 
Jewish nation known as the Hebrews ; a patronymic referring 
to Abraham, the progenitor of the Jewish race, having crossed 
the river Euphrates when he immigrated to the promised 
land of Palestine. "Israelite" was the term used to designate 
a Jew among his brethren, as "Hebrew" was used among other 
nations. But those Jews who were scattered abroad and did 
not constitute a part of the nation were called "the Disper- 
sion; 2 * while in the New Testament they were called, not 



17 Tal. Avoda Zara, 1 ; Gemara Bab. ad Sanhedr. v. 18 Lightfoot. 

» John xi, 47; Matt, xxvi, 65; Luke xxiii, 2. 20 Acts iii, iv. 

21 lb. xxiv, 5. 22 j&. V ii. 28 ib. xxii, 30; xxiii, 1, 2. 

24 John, vii, 35. 



508 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Greeks, but "Grecians" or "Grecian Jews"* Those dis- 
persed abroad among different nations spoke the Greek lan- 
guage, which was another point of difference. That ancient 
Hebrew spoken by their ancient ancestors was lost to the 
Jews during their Babylonian captivity, and was replaced by 
a dialect of the Chaldee known as the Syro-Chaldaic or later 
Aramaean tongue, which thence became the vernacular of the 
Palestinian Jews, now known as "the Hebrew." Three lan- 
guages were spoken in Palestine in the time of Christ, — the 
Latin, which was the language of the court; the Greek, 
which was the common commercial language of the nations ; 
and the Hebrew, which was the vernacular of the Jews. 

The Jews of Palestine had their temple for religious serv- 
ices, while those of the "Dispersion" were not excluded there- 
_ from, but had among the nations their svna- 

§359. Differ- ' & 

encesm gogues as places of worship. Foreign Jews 
recited their Greek sentences and read their 
Sabbath lessons from the Pentateuch or the prophets in the 
Greek Septuagint, according to Rabbi Elias Levita, or from 
the Hebrew Scriptures, by means of an interpreter, according 
to Lightfoot and Yitringa and the Talmudists. The Talmud- 
ists say that, in the Law, only one verse was read at a time 
for fear of a mistake, but three verses were read by the 
reader at a time when an interpreter translated them. 

These differences of locality and language gave rise to nar- 
row prejudices, greatly to the disadvantage of those of the 
Dispersion. It was made a matter of Talmudic record that 
" the Jewish offspring of Babylon is more valuable than that 

*In the New Testament a distinction is observed, 'EXX77V being rendered 
Greek, and 'EM^icmfc , Grecian. The difference of the English termination, how- 
ever, is not sufficient to convey the difference of meanings. 'EXX^ in the New 
Testament is either a Greek by race, as in Acts xvi, 1-3; xviii, 17; Rom. i, 14; or 
more frequently a Gentile, as opposed to a Jew (Rom. ii, 9, 10, etc.); so fern. 
'EWwvl?, Mark vii, 26; Acts xvii, 12. 'EXX^wcmfc (properly "one who speaks 
Greek") is a foreign Jew; opposed, therefore, not to 'IouSatof, but to 'E(3pator, 
a home-Jew, one who dwelt in Palestine." (Smith's Bible Dictionary, Vol. II, 
Hackett's edition, p. 967, first column). 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 509 

in Judaea itself." 25 Rabbi Levi Ben-Chaiatha, upon hearing 
some Jews on their way to Caesarea reciting sentences in the 
Law in Greek, disallowed it on account of the 

' §360. Dififer- 

language; upon the hearing of which, Rabbi ences begot 
Jose, with much indignation, demanded : " If a Dlsadvanta ^ es - 
.man does not know how to recite in the holy tongue [the 
Hebrew], must he not recite them at all? Let him perform 
this duty in what language he can." m The Hellenistic Jews, 
speaking the Greek language as their vernacular, were regarded 
as the inferiors of the Palestinian Jews who spoke the Hebrew 
or later Aramaean. The Babylonian Talmud was esteemed as 
much superior to that of Jerusalem. Josephus, who wrote his 
Histories in the Greek language, states the prejudice of his 
countrymen against the Greek thus : 

" Our nation does not encourage those that learn the language of 
many nations, and so adorn their discourses with the smoothness of their 
periods, because they look upon this sort of accomplishment as common, 
not only to all kinds of freedmen, but to as many servants as may choose 
to learn them. But they give him the testimony of being a wise man 
who is fully acquainted with our laws, and is able to interpret their 
meaning." 27 

During the period of the Roman-Jewish war the Talmud- 
ists recorded a decree prohibiting a father teaching his son the 
Greek philosophy, under a ban : 

"Cursed is the man who teacheth his sons the wisdom of the 
Greeks." 28 "Rabbin Simeon, the son of Gamaliel, is made to say: 
'There were a thousand in my father's school [i. e., Hillel's], of whom 
five hundred learned the Law, and five hundred the wisdom of the Greeks ; 
and there is not now one of the last alive excepting myself and my 
uncle's son.' " 29 

The meaning of this extraordinary statement is, that God 
vindicated the " curse " of the decree issued by the Sanhedrin 

85 Lightfoot, Hebraic and Talmudic Exercit. Vol. II, p. 967. 
26 Tal. Jems. Sota, fol. xxi, 2. * Ant. xx, 11, 2. 

28 Bava Kam. fol. 82, 2; and Mishna, Sota, 9, 14. 
29 Gemdra, Bav. Kam. f . 82, and Sota, f. 40, 1, in Lightfoot, ii, p. 660. 



510 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

against Greek letters and learning; nevertheless, there was 
one qualification admitted: "They allowed the family of 
Kabbin Gamaliel the Greek learning, because it was allied to 
the royal blood." With such prejudice and contempt for the 
language which had become the vernacular of the Jews of the 
Dispersion, it is easy to infer the self-asserted superiority of 
the " home- Jew " for his brother born in a foreign land. 

These historical circumstances and distinctions indicated 

are not only in entire agreement with the Scriptures, but are 

notablv preserved and incidentallv interwoven 

§361.Distinc- " r J 

tions in the New with the very text. The principal points to be 
observed are the universal "Dispersion" of the 
Jewish race among the nations, the several appellations desig- 
nating the Palestinean and the foreign Jews, and the worship 
of the Synagogue in place of that of the Temple as a neces- 
sity. These facts, as being already existent, are particularized 
in the dedication of the Sacred Writings, in the practical work 
of the apostles, no less than in the ministry of Christ. 

a) The Jews asked among themselves : " Will he go unto the 
Dispersion among the Greeks, and teach the Greeks ?" x James 
dedicates his Epistle 31 "To the Twelve Tribes which are of the 
Dispersion." Peter, in his first Epistle, 32 addresses "The elect 
who are sojourners of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cap- 
padocia, Asia, and Bithynia." 

/3) Paul wrote to the Corinthians: "Are they Hebrews? 
So am I. Are they Israelites ? So am I. Are they the seed 
of Abraham? So ami." 33 To the Philippians he wrote: 
"Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the 
tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews." M That is, to 
the brethren abroad he made himself known by the familiar 
name of Israelite • to the Gentile nations as a Hebrew ; and 
to all, as " a Hebrew of the Hebrews" meaning that there was 
no proselyte blood coursing in his veins. 

y) In Asia, Paul and Barnabas " came to Antioch in Pisidia, 

30 John vii, 34, 35. « Epis. i, 1. 32ip e t. i, 1. 33 2 Cor. xi, 22. * Phil, iii, 5. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 511 

and went into the synagogue on the Sabbath-day, and sat 
down," ffi and on invitation Paul preached. At Iconium they 
"entered together into the synagogue of the Jews, and so 
spake that a great multitude both of Jews and Greeks be- 
lieved." 36 Also in Mwqpe, as in. Asia, Paul and Silas "came to 
Thessalonica, where was a synagogue of the Jews." 37 At 
Athens, Paul "reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and 
devout persons." ffl At Corinth " he reasoned in the synagogue 
every Sabbath, and persuaded Jews and Greeks." 39 And at the 
great Pentecost at Jerusalem, there were present "Jews, de- 
vout men from every nation under heaven." 40 
Josephus states that — 

"The Jewish nation is widely dispersed over the habitable earth 
among its inhabitants." 41 "Avery sad calamity now befell the Jews 
that were in Mesopotamia, and especially those that dwelt in Baby- 
lonia." 42 

In agreement with the facts cited, Luke records an item of 
history respecting the early Christians at Jerusalem : 

" Now in these days when the number of the disciples was multiply- 
ing, there arose a murmuring of the Grecian Jews against the Hebrews, 
because their widows were neglected in the daily ministrations." 43 

The dispersion of so large a portion of the Jewish popula- 
tion is thus shown to be historical, corroborating the references 
to the condition of the Jews abroad made in the New Testa- 
ment. But the non-intercourse of the home and the foreign 
Jews; the loss of "the holy tongue" as the popular vernacular 
on the part of the dispersed; the substitution therefor of the 
Greek, which in Palestine was placed under the ban of a 
curse ; the self-conscious superiority assumed by the " home- 
Jew" in his relation to the daily temple-service; his being 
under the government of the Sandedrin, which was so re- 
vered, — these, and other circumstances of like character, 

» Acts xiii, 14. s 6 lb. xiv, 1. » Acts xvii, 1. 

38 lb. xvii, 17. 39 -rt>. xvill, 4. «>J7>.ii, 5. 

« Wars, vii, 3, 3. « Ant. xviil, 9, 1 . « Acts vi, 1. 



512 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

explain the narrow bias felt towards trie brethren of the 
" Dispersion," as well as the partiality and injustice practiced 
towards the widows of the Jewish Christians, calling for a 
Board of Administration to be organized, in which Philip the 
Evangelist and Stephen occupied a conspicuous place. 

The sects of the Jews have prominence in sacred history. 

The principal divisions were the Pharisees, the Sadducees, 

and the Essenes, the last of which are not men- 

!ectsan<Tthe tioned in the New Testament. They were not a 

New Testa- distinct class of persons, but with a distinct set of 

merit. . . 

beliefs. The Pharisees were distinguished chiefly 
for their maintenance of the doctrine that man possessed a spirit ; 
that the spirit is immortal; that the body will have a resurrec- 
tion; and they further held that oral traditions, which they 
claimed had descended from the ancient elders of Israel in the 
time of Moses, were equally binding upon the Jews with their 
Scriptures. The Sadducees originated about B. C. 160-143 
under Jonathan, successor to Judas Maccabaeus, 44 and were dis- 
tinguished for their rejection of that doctrine believed by the 
Pharisees. Each sect had its own institution of learning at Je- 
rusalem, founded to maintain and advance its own faith. Hillel 
represented the Pharisees, whose head was the famous Eabban 
Gamaliel and his renowned descendants. Shammai represented 
the views of the Sadducees. These two sects were ever in 
open contention ; so that it passed into a proverb, " That even 
Elijah the Tishbite would not be able to reconcile the adher- 
ents of Hillel and Shammai." fi 

The Pharisees were most prominent in the account of the 
Gospels, and were the more severely dealt with by Jesus because 
they made obligatory their self-imposed "traditions;"® but 
the Sadducees were noted for their fierce character, and the 
Saclducean high priest Caiaphas and his father-in-law Annas 
maliciously extorted from Pilate the death-warrant of Christ. 
However, after the crucifixion and the claim made by the 

"A nt. xiii, 10, 6 ; xviii, 1, 4. « Kitto. « Matt, xxiii. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 513 

Christian Jews of Christ's resurrection, the Pharisees no longer 
appear in the foreground of persecution of the apostles, as if in 
some measure sympathizing with Christian doctrine. 47 Once 
the Sadducees attempted to entrap Jesus by proposing a ques- 
tion of a man who had had seven wives in succession, whose 
husband would he be in the resurrection. But Jesus " put the 
Sadducees to silence." 48 

This Jewish historian says : 

" At this time there were sects among the Jews : . . . the one was 
called the sect of the Pharisees, another the sect of the Sadducees. " 49 
"The Pharisees have delivered to the people a great 
many observances by succession from their fathers which § 363, Jose Phus 
are not written in the law of Moses ; and for that reason these Sects, 
it is that the Sadducees reject them, and say that we are 
to esteem those observances to be obligatory which are in the written 
Word, but not to observe what are derived from the tradition of our 
fathers. And concerning these things it is that great disputes and differ- 
ences have risen among them." 50 The Pharisees "believe that souls 
have an immortal vigor in them;" that "there will be rewards and 
punishments according as they have lived virtuously or viciously in this 
life ;" that the wicked will be " detained in an everlasting prison," but 
the righteous "shall have power to revive and live again." "But the 
doctrine of the Sadducees is this, that souls die with the bodies." 51 " The 
behavior of the Sadducees one toward another is in some degree wild, 
and their conduct with those of their own party is as barbarous as if they 
were strangers to them." 52 

Paul makes distinct claim to being a Pharisee, educated 
" at the feet of Gamaliel," s " exceedingly zealous for the tradi- 
tions " of his fathers ; M "as touching the law a Pharisee." ffi In 
the Sanhedrin he said : " I am a Pharisee, a son of a Pharisee." * 
But for his pharisaic traditions, we should never have known 
that it was " Jannes and Jambres" who "withstood Moses" 
before Pharaoh. 57 

In the time of Christ's ministry there existed hereditary 
enmity between the Jews and the Samaritans, the origin of 
which dated centuries earlier. The Samaritans were a mixed 



fl Comp. Acts v, 17, 34-40, and xxiii, 6-9. *& Matt, xxii, 25-34. 

« Ant. xiii, 5, 9 ; Wars, ii, 8, 2. 50 Ant. xiii, 10, 6. 

6i Ant. xvili, 1, 3, 4. « Wars, ii, 8, 14. 53 Acts xxii, 3. « Gal. i, 14. 

55 Phil, iii, 5. 56 Acts xxiii, 6-8. 57 2 Tim. iii, 8; comp. Ex.vii, 11; viii, 17-20, etc. 



514 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

race of Assyrian descendants and renegade Jews, and others 
of foreign extraction. During the period of the Babylonian 
captivity, the Samaritans ravaged and occupied 
jews and Jewish estates ; and upon the return of the two 
tribes the Jews excluded them from all participa- 
tion in the temple. The Samaritans were called the " adver- 
saries of Judah and Benjamin." 58 This racial dislike and 
hostility are more than intimated in several passages in the 
Gospels. The woman at Jacob's well said unto Jesus: "How 
is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me who am a 
woman of Samaria; for the Jews have no dealings with the 
Samaritans?" 59 In another instance the Lord, with his disciples, 
was journeying toward Jerusalem, and a certain Samaritan 
village refused to accord the usual rights of sacred hospitality, 
for this express reason : 

" Because his face was as though he were going to Jerusalem. And 
when his disciples saw this, they said: Lord, wilt thou that we bid fire 
come down from heaven and consume them, even as Elijah did? But he 
turned and rebuked them, and said: Ye know not what manner of spirit 
ye are of." w 

A more opprobrious term the Jews could not employ against 
Jesus than this : " Say we not well that thou art a Samaritan, 
and hast a devil?" Of the ten lepers cleansed by Jesus, only 
one returned to him "to give glory to God," "and he was a 
Samaritan." 61 

Josephus confirms the enmity and antagonism existing be- 
tween these two peoples when he mentions how the Samaritans 
" distressed the Jews, cutting off parts of their land and carrying 
off slaves ;" 62 how the Samaritans attacked the Galileans who 
were journeying to Jerusalem to their festivals, passing through 
Samaria, when many Jews were killed ; ffl and withal, how the 
Samaritans stole into the city by night and " threw about dead 
men's bodies in the cloisters" of the temple, "on which ac- 
es Ezra iv, 1, etc. 59 John iv, 9. eo Luke ix, 51-55. 
61 John viii, 48; Luke xvii, 15-18. 62 Ant. xll, 4, 1. 
G3 Id. xx, 6, 1 ; Life of Josephus, § 52. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 515 

count the Jews afterward excluded them out of the temple, 
which they had not been used to do at such festivals." 64 These 
instances sufficiently illustrate and demonstrate the ancient 
animosity existing between these two races, occupying the 
country of Palestine, and more than verify as historical the 
fact so briefly and incidentally alluded to in the Gospels. 

It is a sad indictment of the characteristics of the Jews of 
that period, which Josephus makes against his own people con- 
cerning their contumacious spirit, their disposi- 
tion to conspiracies, and their general practices Jewish 

j, . t,. TT . j i. .i • , Characteristics. 

of immoralities. His deliverance on these points 

are suggestive of the tone and trend of one who was himself a 

witness, or was otherwise well assured of the facts involved in 

what he narrates. 

a) A Spirit of Insubordination. Matthew relates how the 

Pharisees in behalf of the Jews, and the Herodians in behalf 

of the Eomans, conspired together to ensnare Jesus, when they 

approached him with a proposition for his answer which they 

intended should deprive him of his influence over the Jews, or, 

on the other hand, cause him to forfeit his life for treason to 

the Komans. After the most flattering words they said : 

" Tell us therefore, What thinkest thou: is it lawful to give tribute 
unto Caesar or not? But Jesus perceived their wickedness and said: 
Why tempt ye me, ye hypocrites? Show me the tribute money. And 
they brought unto him a penny. And he saith unto them, Whose is this 
image and superscription? They say unto him, Caesar's. Then saith he 
unto them: Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto 
God the things which are God's. And when they heard it, they marveled, 
and left him and went their way." u 

Luke records the speech of the famous Gamaliel in defense 
of the apostles before the Sanhedrin, when he said : 

" Before these days rose up Theudas, giving himself out to be some- 
body ; to whom a number of men, about four hundred, joined themselves, 
who were slain ; and all, as many as obeyed him, were dispersed and 
came to nought. After this, rose up Judas of Galilee in the days of the 
enrollment, and drew away some of the people after him ; he also per- 
ished, and all, as many as obeyed him, were scattered abroad." 66 

<» Ant. xvm,2,2. 65Matt. xxii, 15-33. 66 Acts v, 35-39. 



516 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

At this point several things are to be kept in sight : 

1. That, historically, the Jewish nation was divided as to 
the right and policy of resisting the imperial government in 
taxing the Jewish estates; a fact evidenced by the question 
submitted to Christ for his decision by the mutually opposing 
parties touching the legitimacy of that measure. 

2. That the time of this taxing was in the second enroll- 
ment of Cyrenius, which occurred in A. D. 6 corrected, or 
A. D. 10 of our present current chronology; his first enroll- 
ment having been taken B. C. 4, when Christ was born, which 
was of the Jews' population; the second of their property f ( — 
and there is no account whatever of any other enrollment 
afterwards. 

3. That it was the enforcement of this taxation upon prop- 
erty which was the occasion for the open revolt of Judas of 
Galilee, referred to by Gamaliel, and passed as understood by 
the Sanhedrists as historical, when the apostles were before 
them for examination respecting the facts and doctrines which 
they were preaching. 

4. We have no other account of this particular Theudas 
named by Gamaliel, whose revolt dates prior to the enroll- 
ment of Cyrenius, since " after this man rose up Judas of Gal- 
ilee in the days of the enrollment" of whom Josephus gives 
considerable information and confirmation. Nevertheless, he 
narrates particulars of a later Theudas, an impostor, whose 
exploits occurred in the procuratorship of Cuspius Fadus 
(A. D. 44-46), who was slain with many others. 68 

Josephus authenticates the case of a Judas as occurring 
under the procuratorship of Coponius, which was A. D. 6-9 
corrected chronology. He says : 

" Coponius, also a man of the equestrian order, was sent to have the 
supreme power over the Jews. Moreover, Cyrenius came himself into 
Judaea ... to take an account of their substance. There was one 
Judas, a Gaulonite, of the city, whose name was Gamala, who, taking 

"See $59 (7). <* Ant. xx, 5, 1 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 517 

with him Sadduc, a Pharisee, became zealous to draw them to a revolt, 
who both said that this taxation was no better than an introduction to 
slavery, and exhorted the nation to assert their liberty." 69 " The sons of 
Judas of Galilee were now slain ; I mean that Judas who caused the peo- 
ple to revolt when Cyrenius came to take an account of the estates of 
the Jews, as we have shown in a foregoing book." 70 

P) A Disposition for Conspiracies. This characteristic 
spirit of the Jews illustrated itself in the time of the apostles, 
when "the Jews banded together and bound themselves with 
a curse, saying that they would neither eat nor drink till they 
had killed Paul; and they were more than forty who made 
this conspiracy." n But the conspiracy was detected and de- 
feated by the apostle's nephew, " Paul's sister's son." 

It is mentioned in Jewish history that a similar conspiracy 
was organized against the life of Herod the Great in the early 
part of his reign, on account of his having introduced strange 
and heathen customs among the Jews and forced them upon 
the people. " Ten men that were citizens [of Jerusalem] con- 
spired together against him, and sware to one another to 
undergo any dangers in the attempt; and took daggers with 
them under their garments" for the purpose of killing Herod. 
But the plot was detected, exposed, and the parties implicated 
suffered deaths 

These instances are sufficient to illustrate the character and 
condition of the Jews at that period. The case of Paul is 
interesting in that the conspirators boldly approached the 
chief priests and Sanhedrists, the highest judicial body of the 
Jews and rulers of the nation, seeking their complicity by 
co-operation in this self-confessed plot to assassinate a man for 
the crime of being a Christian; a fact which naturally recalls 
an earlier conspiracy, conceived in deadly malice, and cul- 
minating in the crucifixion of the Son of God. 

y) Immorality of Conduct. We are indebted to one who 
was himself a Jew and a priest and historian of the Jews for 

™Ant. xviii, 1, 1; Wars, ii, 8, 1; lb. vii, 8, 1. ™ Ant. xx, 5, 2. 

71 Acts xxiii, 12-16. « Ant. xv, 8, 3, 4. 



518 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

the following terrible arraignment of his brethren who were 
his contemporaries. Josephus thus witnesses : 

" That was a time most fertile in all manner of wicked practices, 
insomuch that no kind of evil deeds were then left undone ; nor could 
any one so much as devise any bad thing that was new ; so deeply were 
* they all infected and strove with one another, in their single capacity 
and their communities, who should run the greatest lengths in impiety 
towards God, and in unjust actions toward their neighbors ; the men of 
power oppressing the multitude, and the multitude earnestly laboring 
to destroy the men of power. The one part were desirous of tyranniz- 
ing over others ; and the rest offering violence to others, and plundering 
such as were richer than themselves. " 73 

He further makes a record touching the iniquities of his 
brethren to the effect that "no city ever suffered such mis- 
eries," " no age, since the beginning of the world," " ever bred 
a generation more fruitful in wickedness ;" that they overthrew 
the city and forced the Roman army to come and make a con- 
quest of their nation, and that they drew the fire which con- 
sumed the temple of God at Jerusalem. Then, as a final 
arraignment, he adds: 

" I suppose that had the Romans made any longer delay in coming 
against these villains the city would either have been swallowed up by 
the ground opening upon them, or been overflowed by water, or else 
been destroyed by such thunder- [storms] as the country of Sodom per- 
ished by ; for it brought forth a generation of men much more athe- 
istical than were those that suffered such punishments ; for by their 
madness it was that all the people were destroyed." 74 

II. The Destruction of the Jewish Nation. 

The Lord Jesus, having wept over Jerusalem, left the temple 

accompanied by his disciples, and ascended the slopes of the 

Mount of Olives to the east of the city, over 

§366. Predic- _ . ' 

tions of opposite the sacred courts. From this point the 
Holy City was to be seen at the greatest advan- 
tage, overlooking the walls. His disciples directed his atten- 
tion to the magnificence of the buildings which adorned the 
sacred grounds of the temple. Jesus there gave utterance to 

73 Wars, vli, 8, 1. ™ lb. v, 13, 6. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 519 

that which was at once one of the most marvelous, as well as 
most momentous, predictions that ever fell from prophetic lips, 
or found verification in human history. It was his prophecy 
of the desolation of Jerusalem, the destruction of the temple, 
involving the overthrow of the Jewish nation, the expatriation 
of the people, and the discontinuance of the theocracy. As 
the distinguished historian Milman remarks : 

"The distinctness, the minuteness, the circumstantial accuracy 
with which the prophetic outline of the siege and fall of Jerusalem is 
drawn, bear, perhaps, greater evidence of more than human foreknowl- 
edge than any other in the sacred volume/' 75 

The Prediction: "And Jesus went out of the temple and was going 
on his way, and his disciples came unto him to show him the buildings 
of the temple. . . . And as he sat on Olivet the disciples came unto 
him privately, saying: Tell us when will these things be? And what 
will be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?" 76 

"And as some spake of the temple, how it was adorned with goodly 
stones and offerings, he said: As for these things which ye behold, the 
days will come in which there shall not be left one stone upon another 
that shall not be thrown down! And they asked him, saying: Master, 
when shall these things be, and what will be the sign when these things 
are about to come to pass? " 77 

Obviously here are two distinct questions asked, and two 
different replies given. Matthew gives prominence to the 
signs of Christ's coming at "the end of the world." Luke 
gives prominence to the destruction of the temple, when "there 
shall not be left one stone upon another." To avoid confusion 
of understanding respecting which event is referred to in the 
twofold answer returned, the two lines of thought related to 
the two subjects of Christ's prediction should be carefully dis- 
criminated. The present discussion is interested only in the 
proposition appertaining to the overthrow of the Jewish theoc- 
racy, including all that that conveys, so circumstantially fore- 
told and historically fulfilled. This is restricted to the de- 
struction of Jerusalem and the Jewish nationality. The 
Synoptic Gospels contain the complete record of this conver- 

™Hist. of Christianity, Vol. I, 311. 76 Matt, xxiv, 1-3. " Luke xxl, 5-7. 



520 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

sation, at least so far as transmitted to us.* The following 
particulars may be elicited from these Scriptures : 

1. There would first arise many false Messiahs and impostors. 

2. But the Gospel would first be published unto all the nations. 

3. Then would be realized by the Jews "the beginning of 

sorrows." 

4. The final calamities would be preceded by certain signs. 

5. Of the Christians, not a hair of their heads should perish. 

6. And all these things would occur within the generation 

then living. 
How far this deliverance of Christ was realized when the 
Jews were destroyed in their theocracy and state, remains to 
be verified by the witness of both Jewish and pagan histori- 
ans who were unfriendly to the Christian religion. 

False Messiahs and Impostoes. 
The Prediction: "Jesus answered and said: Take heed that no 
man lead you astray, for many will come in my name saying, I am the 
Christ, and will lead many astray, . . . and many false prophets 
will arise and lead many astray. Then if any man shall say unto you : 
Lo, here is Christ, or there, believe it not ; for there will be many false 
Christs and false prophets, and will show great signs and wonders, so as 
to lead astray, if possible, the very elect." "Behold I have told you 
all things beforehand." 78 

The Fulfillment: Josephus in his Histories records the 

circumstantial realization of this prediction. The evidential 

events selected occurred under the procuratorship of Cuspius 

Fadus, A. D. 44-46; Claudius Felix, 50-58 ; and Portius Fes- 

tus, 58-60. 79 The destruction of the Jewish theocracy and 

commonwealth culminated in the capture and desolation of 

Jerusalem in the year 70. 

a) "Now it came to pass while Fadus was procurator of Judaea, that 

a certain magician whose name was Theudas persuaded a great part of 

8 367. Procu- tne people to take their effects with them, and follow 

rators and him to the river Jordan ; for he told them that he was 

the Fulfillment. a p r0 ph e t, and that he would by his own command 

divide the river [Jordan], and afford them an easy passage over it; and 

*Mark states that the disciples who engaged privately in this conversation 
with Christ were Peter, James, John, and Andrew (xiii, 3). 
73 Matt, xxiv, 4, 5, 11, 23, 24; comp. Mark xiii, 5, 6, 23. 
79 Thomas Lewin. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 521 

many were deluded by his words." 80 But Theudas was captured and 
beheaded, and many of the deluded ones were slain. 

/3) "Now as for the affairs of the Jews, they grew worse and worse 
continually, for the country was again filled with robbers who deluded 
the multitude. Yet did Felix catch and put to death many of the im- 
postors every day." "And now these impostors and deceivers persuaded 
the multitude to follow them into the wilderness, and pretended that 
they would exhibit manifest wonders and signs that should be per- 
formed by the providence of God." 81 

7) "So Festus sent forces, both horsemen and footmen, to fall upon 
those that had been seduced by a certain impostor who promised them 
deliverance and freedom from the miseries they were under, if they 
would follow him as far as the wilderness. Accordingly, those forces 
that were sent destroyed both him that deluded them, and those that 
were his followers also." 82 

In these citations no mention is made by Josephus of " false 
Christs" as such; nevertheless, he does call them false prophets, 
deceivers, and impostors; and many of them promised to 
deliver the Jews from the oppressions and distresses which 
they suffered under the Roman domination, which was the 
popular expectation to be realized in the coming of the Christ. 
So that, not in the form of words, but in the reality, they ver- 
ified Christ's prediction of " false prophets " who would " arise 
and lead many astray." 

The Gospel Given to All Nations. 

The Prediction: "And the gospel shall first be published unto all 
nations." 83 "And this gospel of the kingdom shall be published in the 
whole world, for a witness unto all nations ; and then shall the end 



come 



"84 



The Fulfillment: In Paul's apostolate he preached the 
gospel personally in Antioch, in Syria; at Paphos, in the island, 
Cvprus; at Antioch, in Pisidia ; Iconium, Lystra, 

J ^ ' ' ' ' J ' § 368. The Gos- 

and Derbe, in Lycaonia ; at Perga and Ephesus, pel and the 
in Asia Minor; in Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, Roman World - 
Athens, Corinth, and Rome, in Europe ; as well as in Caesarea 
and Jerusalem, in Palestine. To many of these cities he ad- 
dressed epistles full of Christly instruction. So that this man's 

*>Ant. xx, 5, 1. nib. xx, 8, 5, 6; comp. further Wars, ii, 13, 4, 5; vi, 5, 2, 3. 

MAnt. xx, 8, 10. 83 Mark xiii, 10. 84 Matt, xxlv, 14. 



522 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

apostolical labors more than justified his own affirmation 

that— 

"For I will not dare to speak of any of those things which Christ 
wrought not through me, for the obedience of the Gentiles, by word and 
deed, in the power of signs and wonders in the power of the Holy Ghost ; 
so that from Jerusalem, and round about even unto Illyricum, I have 
fully preached the gospel of Christ ; yea, making it my aim so to preach 
the gospel, not where Christ was already named, that I might not build 
upon another man's foundation ; but as it is written : They shall see to 
whom no tidings of him came ; and they who have not heard, shall un- 
derstand." ^ 

In the same epistle Paul declares of the Christians, that 
"their faith is proclaimed throughout the whole world." 86 
The Apostle Peter also addressed his first epistle to the Chris- 
tians resident in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and 
Bithynia. And at the great Christian Pentecost at Jerusa- 
lem, there were present " Jews, devout men from every nation 
under heaven," who were "confounded, because that every 
man heard them speaking in his own language." And they 
said: 

"How hear we every man in our own language wherein we were 
born? Parthians and Medes and Elamites, and the dwellers in Meso- 
potamia, in Judsea and Cappadocia, in Pontus and Asia, in Phrygia and 
Pamphylia, in Egypt and parts of Libya about Cyrene, and sojourners 
from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians, we do hear 
them speaking in our tongues the mighty works of God." 87 

Eusebius, referring to the Emperor Tiberius having pro- 
posed to the Roman Senate the name of Christ to be enrolled 
among the gods of the State, quotes from the Apology of Ter- 
tullian before the government in the Christians' behalf, the 
following : 

"Tiberius therefore, under whom the name of Christ was spread 
throughout the world, when this doctrine was announced to him from 
Palestine, where it first began, communicated with the Senate, being 
obviously pleased with the doctrine." M 

Tacitus testifies that Christianity, " the pernicious supersti- 
tion, repressed for a time, broke out again, not only through 

85 Romans xv, 18-21. ^Ib. i, 8. 87 Acts 11, 5-11. 

88 Eccl.Hist. ii, 2; comp. Tertullian's Apology, Ante-Nicene Fathers, 111, pp. 21, 22, 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 523 

Judaea where the mischief originated, but through the city of 
Kome also."* About forty-two years after the subjugation of 
Palestine by Titus, Pliny the younger was appointed governor 
of Bithynia. Upon his accession to power he found the Chris- 
tians so numerous in Asia Minor that he sought to suppress 
the religion by either recantation or extermination; and he 
sought the advice of his emperor, Trajan, affirming that the 
course would expose to danger "many of every age, and of 
every rank, and of either sex." ffl He feared for the stability 
of his government over the province. To have attained such 
place and power in a community, the gospel must have been 
preached there within the limits of that generation when the 
prediction was uttered. 

The Beginning of Sorrows. 
The Prediction: "And there shall be famines and earthquakes in 
divers places. But all these things are but the beginning of travail." 90 
" And there shall be great earthquakes, and in divers places famines 
and pestilence." 91 

The Fulfillment: These phenomena of nature, which oc- 
curred during that generation, were very marked as regards 
both frequencv and severity. Luke records the 

^ J J §369. Predicted 

prediction of the Prophet Agabus respecting a Famine 

famine which occurred in the reign of Claudius ; 1S onca ' 

a famine which lasted through several years and spread far 

and wide. 92 Eusebius also refers to it, and remarks : 

"In his reign there was a famine that prevailed over the whole 
world: an event which has been handed down by historians [who arel 
very far from our doctrine ; and by which the prediction of the Prophet 
Agabus, recorded in Acts of the Apostles, respecting the impending 
famine over the whole world, received its fulfillment." 93 

But there are other historical notices of prevailing famine. 
Josephus confirms Luke's account, by relating how that, at that 
time, Queen Helen relieved Jerusalem by furnishing food for 
the hungry in the stress of famine ; M Dion Cassius, in his his- 

* Ann. xv, 44. 

89 Epis. to Trajan, x, 97. *> Matt, xxiv, 7, 8. « Luke xxi, 11. 

92 Acts xi, 28. *Eccl. Hist, ii, 8. ^Ant. xx, 2, 5; xx, 5, 2. 



524 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

tory, also mentions the famine as severely afflicting Home and 
all Italy. 95 Tacitus remarks the fact, affirming " a failure in 
the crops," which was "regarded as a prodigy, and that, "It is 
certain that there was then in Rome provision for only fifteen 
days." 96 Suetonius mentions "a scarcity of provisions occa- 
sioned by bad crops for several successive years," on account 
of which the populace thronged about and abused the em- 
peror, threatening personal violence, he with "some difficulty 
escaping into the palace by a back door!" 97 

Josephus relates that about the year 40 " a pestilence came 
upon those at Babylon" from which the Jews suffered ex- 
tremely. And during the siege of Jerusalem, 
' lence an^ 1 there " came a pestilential destruction upon 
Earthquakes them, and soon after such a famine as destroyed 

Historical. J 

them more suddenly." m As regards earthquakes, 

Eusebius mentions three cities, "Laodicea, Hieropolis, and Co- 

losse, which were overthrown by earthquakes." " Tacitus states 

that " Many prodigies happened this year ; . . . frequent 

earthquakes occurred." 100 Seneca also mentions this great 

calamity, 101 which occurred about A. D. 62 or 63. Tacitus 

adds : 

" This year . . . was by the gods branded with storm and pesti- 
lences." He mentions a whirlwind whose " violence extended so far as 
the neighborhood of the city of Rome, in which a terrible pestilence 
was sweeping away every living thing, without any discernible derange- 
ment of the atmosphere, though the houses were filled with the dead, 
and the streets with funerals. Neither sex nor age was exempt from 
danger ; bondmen and free were snatched off indiscriminately, amid the 
wailing of wives and children, who, while they were yet attending and 
lamenting them, were themselves seized and frequently burned on the 
same funeral pile." 102 

_ Along: with the disturbances in the course of 

§371. Wars & 

and Tumults nature were the disturbances of human society, 
by reason of tumults and wars experienced in 
that generation, which begot sorrows. 

95 Hist, of Borne, i, 49, 60. ^Annals, xii, 43. 97 Claudius, xix. 

98 Wars, vi, 9, 3. " Chron. p. 161. ™ Annals, xii, 43. 

i°i Quaest. Nat. Q. vi, 1. ™ Annals, xvi, 13. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 525 

The Prediction: "And ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. 
See that ye be not troubled, for these things must needs come to pass ; 
but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise up against nation, and 
kingdom against kingdom." 103 "But when ye shall hear of wars and 
tumults, be not terrified: for these things must needs come first; but 
the end is not immediately." 104 

The Fulfillment: About the year 40, at Seleucia, the 
Greeks and Syrians united against the Jews ; " they fell upon 
them and slew about fifty thousand of them; nay, the Jews 
were all destroyed excepting a few who escaped." m Cuspius 
Fadus, having become procurator of Judaea (44-46), "found 
quarrelsome doings between the Jews that dwelt in Peraea 
and the people of Philadelphia, about their borders at a 
village called Mia, that was filled with men of warlike temper ; 
for the Jews of Peraea had taken up arms, . . . and had 
destroyed many of the Philadelphians." m A celebrated quar- 
rel and tumult arose under Cumanus (48-50), between the 
Jews and Samaritans, resulting in the killing of many on both 
sides, the crucifixion of some, and the deposing and banish- 
ment of Cumanus himself . m In a contest between the Jews 
and Syrians, "the daytime was spent in slaughter, and the 
night in fear," until "the cities were filled with dead bod- 
ies." 108 "Those of Askelon slew twenty-five hundred, and 
those of Ptolemais two thousand ; those of Tyre put a great 
many to death, but kept a greater number in prison." m In 
Damascus, ten thousand unarmed Jews were slain in a gymna- 
sium, in one hour's time. 110 "Above thirteen thousand Jews 
were killed" in a night, and plundered of all they had. 111 At 
Csesarea, in one hour's time, twenty thousand Jews were slain, 
" and all Caesarea emptied of its Jewish inhabitants." There- 
upon the Jewish nation arose and destroyed about fifteen cit- 
ies, and many of the villages near these cities they plundered, 
together with an immense slaughter of men in the villages. 112 
At Alexandria, "fifty thousand of them [the Jews] lay down 

103 Matt, xxiv, 6, 7. 104 Luke xxi, 9, 10. 

«* Ant. xviii, 9, 9. we j&. X x, 1, 1. 107 Tb. xx, 6, 1-3. i« Wars, 11, 18, 2 

™Ib. ii, 18, 5. "07ft.il, 20, 2. m lb. 11, 18, 3. u« lb. ii, 18, 1. 

34 



526 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

upon heaps, nor had the remainder been preserved had they 
not betaken themselves to supplication." 113 A Roman soldier 
offering a gross and vulgar insult to the Jews at the Passover 
at Jerusalem, a furor was raised, and the Roman army sta- 
tioned at the garrison Antonia were summoned to quiet the 
tumult, and twenty thousand Jews were killed, which caused 
mourning throughout the nation. 114 

Tacitus, in opening his celebrated Roman History, allud- 
ing to Servius Galba and his first consulship (A. D. 33) and 
afterwards, says: 

"The period before me is fertile in vicissitudes, pregnant with 
sanguinary encounters, embroiled with intestine dissensions, and in the 
intervals of peace, deformed with horrors. Four princes put to death ; 
three civil wars; with foreign enemies more ; and in some conjunctures, 
both at once ; Italy afflicted, moreover, with calamities unheard of, or 
occurring after a long series of ages ; cities overwhelmed or swallowed 
up by earthquakes in the fertile country of Campania; Rome laid 
waste by fire ; her most ancient temples destroyed ; the Capitol itself 
wrapped in flames by the hands of citizens ; . . . the sea crowded with 
exiles ; the rocks stained with blood of murdered citizens ; Rome itself a 
theater of still greater horrors. . . They carried rapine and plunder 
in every direction, impelled by personal hate and armed with terror." 115 

Such is but a part of the melancholy picture of the times, 

fulfilling the prediction of Jesus respecting " the beginning of 

travail" to be experienced by that generation before the final 

catastrophe comes. 

The Signs op Warning. 

The Prediction: "When ye see Jerusalem compassed with armies, 
then know that her desolation is at hand. Then let them that are in 
Judaea flee unto the mountains ; and let them that are in the midst of 
her depart out; and let not them that are in the country enter therein. 
For these are the days of vengeance, that all things which are written 
may be fulfilled." "And not a hair of your head shall perish." 116 
" When ye see the abomination of desolation which was spoken of by 
Daniel the prophet standing in the Holy Place, let them that are in Ju- 
daea flee to the mountains ; let him that is upon the housetop not come 
down to take out the things that are in the house ; and let him that is 
in the field not return back to take his cloak." 117 



us Wars, ii, 18, 8. "* Ant. xx, 5, 3. ™ Hist. B. i, 2. »« Luke xxi, 18-22. 

"7 Matt, xxiv, 16-18; Mark, xili, 14. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 527 

By "abomination of desolation" is meant the abomination 
which desolates — a Hebraism. The reference is to the Koman 
eagles borne by the Roman soldiery at the head 
of the several legions, and were the objects of Abomination of 
Roman worship, by which also they took their 
oath of loyalty to the empire, but were the objects of detesta- 
tion to the Jews. The eagles, therefore, became the symbols 
of the victors. Now, the Jews were taught that they were 
prohibited by the Mosaic "Commandments" from counte- 
nancing any made or graven image of anything in heaven or 
earth; and the Roman eagles were "images." 118 As images 
led to idolatory, the Jews' susceptibilities were extremely sen- 
sitive on this point, and they would not suffer the presence of 
these standards even in Jerusalem, if they could avoid it, 
much less within the inclosure of the temple grounds. On 
one occasion Pilate thought to impose his eagles upon this 
people by stealthily bringing them into the city by night ; but 
upon the discovery of it there was a tumult raised which he 
could not repress; and he felt necessitated to remove them 
back to his headquarters at Csesarea-on-the-Sea. 119 Once Herod 
the Great dedicated a large golden eagle to the temple, 
placing it upon the great gate to the entrance, when one Mat- 
thias, one of the men of eloquence and great interpreters of 
the law, instigated pulling it down and destroying it; for 
which Matthias was burned alive as a seditionist by the king's 
orders. 120 So Yitellius, president of Syria, to whose dominions 
Judaea was attached, while marching his army through the 
Jews' country to attack Aretas, the king of Petraaa, was pre- 
vailed upon by the earnest protest of the principal Jews to 
bear his eagles by another route. 121 Now, because of the gen- 
eral but not universal apostasy from God, the Roman eagles, 
however much an "abomination" to Jewish taste and in- 
stincts, symbolized the Roman power which was to destroy 

"8 Ant. xvii, 6, 2. 119 lb. xviii, 3, 1 ; Wars, ii, 9, 2, 3. 

™A nt. xvii, 6, 2-4. 121 lb, xviii, 5, 3. 



528 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Jerusalem and the temple, and "stand in the holy place" as 
"the abomination which desolates" the sacred places of their 
worship. 

The Fulfillment: The time had come in that generation 
when a military movement was inaugurated against the Jews, 

by which the Christians of that community should 
of cognize the signs of warning, and make good 

their escape from the sufferings to come. Jesus 
had said: "When ye see Jerusalem compassed with armies, 
then know that her desolation is at hand." "And not a hair 
of your head shall perish." For certain reasons, Cestius 
Gallus, president of Syria, marched his army to the Holy 
City and besieged it. This was the first investment of Jeru- 
salem. Josephus relates that this brief siege was made in 
the twelfth year of Nero (54-68), which would be in the 
year 66 A. D. of the current Christian era;* and that, after 
burning certain portions of the city, Cestius pitched his camp 
over against the royal palace. He adds : 

"Had he at this very time attempted to get within the walls by 
force he had won the city presently, and the war had been put an end to 
at once." "And now it was that a horrible fear seized upon the sedi- 
tious [Jews] insomuch that many of them ran out of the city as though 
it were to be taken immediately." . . . But instead, " he recalled 
his soldiers from the place, and despairing of any expectation of taking 
it, without receiving any disgrace, he retired from the city without any rea- 
son in the world." "After this calamity had befallen Cestius, many of 
the most eminent of the Jews forsook the city as men do a sinking ship." 122 

This was the opportune moment for the escape of the Jew- 
ish Christians of that community from the awful calamities 
mi - x. which were to come in the near future. The 

§374. The Es- 
cape of the day for which they had watched and waited, as 

Christ had admonished them, was now at hand ; 

for, as remarked by Dr. Philip Schaff : 

"The Christians of Jerusalem, remembering the Lord's admoni- 
tion, forsook the doomed city in good time, and fled to the town of Pella 

*Eusebius places the escape before the war under Titus (irpb tov ttoX^/jlov) 
which agrees with the above date— four years before the destruction of Jerusalem 
in A. D. 70. 

122 Wars, ii, 19, 6, 7; and note, and ii, 20, 1. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 529 



in the Decapolis, beyond the Jordan, in the north of Peraea, where 
Herod Agrippa II, before whom Paul once stood, opened to them a 
safe asylum. An old tradition says that a divine voice, or angel, re- 
vealed to their leaders the duty of flight. There, in the midst of 
a population chiefly Gentile, the Church of the Circumcision was re- 
constructed. Unfortunately, its history is hidden from us. But [the 
city] never recovered its former importance. When Jerusalem was 
rebuilt as a Christian city, its bishop was raised to the dignity of one of 
the four Patriarchs of the East, but it was a patriarchate of honor, not 
of power, and sank to a mere shadow after the Mohammedan invasion. 123 

Eusebius, the author of the first Christian history which 

has been handed down to us, gives the following account of 

the exodus of the Christians from Jerusalem : 

"The rest of the apostles, who were harassed in innumerable 
ways with a view to destroy them, and driven from the land of Judaea, 
had gone forth to preach the gospel to all nations, relying upon the aid 
of Christ, when he said: ' Go ye, teach all nations in my name.' The 
whole body, however, of the Church at Jerusalem, having been com- 
manded by a Divine revelation, given to men of approved piety there 
before the war, removed from the city, and dwelt in a certain town 
beyond the Jordan called Pella. Here those that believed in Christ 
having removed from Jerusalem, as if holy men had entirely abandoned 
the royal city itself and the whole land of Judaea, the Divine Justice 
for their crimes against Christ and his apostles finally overtook them, 
totally destroying the whole generation of these evil-doers from the 
earth." 124 

Epiphanius, who lived a little earlier, 125 mentions the Chris- 
tians dwelling in Jerusalem, as being warned by Christ of the 
approaching siege and removing to Pella, being warned by an 
angel; and in another book he speaks of the return of the 
Christians thence afterwards, when Hadrian had rebuilt the 
city, calling it by his own name, ^Elia Colonia. As respects 
the failure of the Jews pent up in Jerusalem to regard the 
signs of the approaching doom which was about to destroy 
the temple and city, and to overthrow and displace their 
apostate nation for having crucified the Christ of God, 
Josephus, though not conscious of that cause, remarks : 

" It is not possible for men to avoid fate, although they may see it 
beforehand. But these men interpreted some of these signs according 

"a Hist. Christ. Church, i, 402. ™Eccl. Hist. B. iii, 5. 

125 About A. D. 310, Hares Nazarceorum. c.7. 



530 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



to their own pleasure ; and some of them they utterly despised, until 
their madness was demonstrated both by the taking of the city and their 
own destruction." 126 

Accomplished in that Generation. 

The Prediction : Jesus exposed the sins and hypocrisy of 
scribes and Pharisees present before the multitude, as the 
leaders of the apostate people ; yet with sympa- 
vengeance?n thy and tenderness did he even weep and 
that Genera- lament as he predicted the doom impending 
over that generation, which meant the com- 
plete destruction of the nation. He said : 

" Behold, I send unto you prophets and wise men and scribes ; some 
of them ye will kill and crucify ; and some of them ye will scourge in 
your synagogues, and persecute from city to city ; that upon you may 
come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of Abel 
the righteous unto the blood of Zachariah son of Barachiah, whom ye 
slew between the sanctuary and the altar. Verily I say unto you, all 
these things shall come upon this generation. 

" O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killeth the prophets, and stoneth 
them that are sent unto her ! How often would I have gathered thy 
children together even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her 
wings, and ye would not! Behold, your house is left unto you 
desolate !" 127 

" And when he drew nigh he saw the city and wept over it, saying: 
If thou hadst known in this day, even thou, the things which belong unto 
peace ! but now they are hid from thine eyes. For the days shall come 
upon thee when thine enemies shall cast up a bank 128 about thee, and 
compass thee round, and keep thee in on every side, and shall dash thee to 
the ground, and thy children within thee ; and they shall not leave in thee 
one stone upon another ; because thou knowest not the time of thy 
visitation." " For these are the days of vengeance, that all things which 
are written may be fulfilled. . . . And they shall fall by the edge 
of the sword, and shall be led captive into all the nations; and Jerusa- 
lem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gen- 
tiles be fulfilled. . . . But when these things begin to come to pass, 
look up, and lift up your heads ; because your redemption draweth 
nigh. . . . Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass 
away till all things be accomplished. Heaven and earth shall pass 
away ; but my word shall not pass away." m 

126 Wars, vi, 5, 4. ™ Matt, xxiii, 34-38. 

128 '0 x6p a %, a palisade; i. e., rows of pales between which earth, stones, and 
timbers were heaped and packed together as a rampart for defense. 

129 Luke xix, 41-44 ; xxi, 22-24, 28, 32, 33. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 531 

For clearness of statement, circumstantiality of fulfillment 
in history, and for tenderness of pathos in the prophet, the 
Scriptures contain no parallel to this prediction of Christ. It 
seems remarkable that no apostle or Evangelist makes any 
reference to the terrible calamities denounced against that 
generation, especially as the destruction of the temple is men- 
tioned by heathen and Jewish historians who were contem- 
porary with the event described. Barnabas, the Apostolic 
Father, who wrote A. D. 70-79, states that the temple was 
destroyed accordant with the purpose of God, by the enemies 
of the Jews, through war. But such mention of the catastro- 
phe only renders the more conspicuous the neglect of the 
sacred writers. But the satisfactory explanation is to be found 
in the fact that the Synoptic Gospels and all the Epistles were 
written some years prior to the fulfillment of the prediction, 
and not one was a witness of the event. These Gospels contain 
the prediction, but not its realization. According to Clement 
of Alexandria (b. 150), Matthew continued his stay at Jeru- 
salem with the other apostles, busy with his countrymen for a 
period of twelve years after the crucifixion of Christ. After 
that they were abroad, "teaching all nations," accordant with 
their great commission. When, then, the Evangelists had re- 
corded the prophecy, their work was done ; and the realization 
and vindication of the prediction was left to its development 
in history and record by those who were enemies of Christ 
Josephus and the Talmudists on the part of the Jews, and 
Tacitus, Suetonius, and Dion Cassius on the part of the heathen 
historians, witness to the historical fulfillment of Christ's pre- 
diction respecting the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple. 

The fulfillment: The prophecy contains sev- 

.„ ,.. , ., p §376. Partic- 

eral specific predictions, the evidence of whose cir- uiars in the 
cumstantial realization may now be considered in Predictlon - 
detail. 

a) "For the days will come when thine enemies will cast a 
bank about thee." 



532 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Josephus says that, 

Titus " ordered that they should bring timber together, and raise 
banks against the city. . . . He placed those that shot darts and the 
archers in the midst of the banks that they were then raising." 130 " So 
now Titus's banks were advanced a great way." 131 

ft) " And they will compass thee round and keep thee in on 
every side?. 

Alford, in his Greek Testament, says: "When the Jews 
destroyed this [military palisade] Titus built a wall around 
them, to which the Lord tacitly refers." 132 

Tacitus says : 

" Such was the city and such the nation against which Titus Caesar 
determined to act by means of mounds and mantelets ; such being the 
nature of the locality, it was adverse to assault and sudden attack." 13S 

Josephus says that Titus told his officers that, 

" They [the Eomans] must build a wall about the whole city, . . . 
the only way to prevent the Jews from coming out in any way . . . that, 
besides this wall, ... he would take care then to have the banks 
raised again. These arguments prevailed with the commanders. So 
Titus ordered that the army should be distributed to their several shares 
of the work. . . . Now, the length of the wall was forty furlongs, 
one only abated [nearly five miles long]. . . . The whole was com- 
pleted in three days, . . . in so short an interval of time as is in- 
credible. ... So all hope of escape was now cut off from the Jews, 
together with all liberty of going out of the city." 

" When Titus had therefore encompassed the city with this wall, 
and put garrisons into proper places, he went round the wall at the 
first watch of the night, and observed how the guard was kept ; the 
second watch was allotted to Alexander ; the commander of legions took 
the third watch." 134 

y) " For there shall he great tribulation, such as there hath 
not been since the beginning of the world until now, no, nor ever 
shall be?™ 

Josephus continues : 

" Then did the famine widen its progress, and it devoured the people 
by whole houses and families ; the upper rooms were full of women and 
children dying of famine ; and the lanes of the city were full of dead 

180 Wars v, 6, 2. m lb. v, 11, 1. ^Commentary on Luke xlx, 48, in Vol. I, 625 
™Hist. v. 13. 134 wars, v, 12, 1, 2; comp. Isa. xxix, 1-8. 

las Matt, xxiv, 21; Mark xlii, 19. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 533 

bodies of the aged ; the children also, and the young men wandering 
about the market-places like shadows, all swelled with famine, and fell 
down dead wheresoever their misery seized them. . . . Nor was 
there any lamentation made under these calamities, nor were heard any 
mournful complaints ; but the famine confounded all natural passion ; 
for those who were just going to die looked upon those who were gone 
before them with dry eyes and open mouths. A deep silence also, and a 
kind of deadly night, had seized upon the city." 136 

8) " They shall dash thee to the ground, and thy children 
within thee." 

Josephus continues the story of the siege in fulfillment of 
Christ's prediction : 

" Many of the eminent citizens told [Titus that 1 . . . the entire 
number of the poor that were dead [were] no fewer than six hundred 
thousand [who] were thrown out of the gates, though still the number 
of the rest could not be discovered ; and they told him, further, that 
when they were no longer able to carry out the dead bodies of the poor, 
they laid the corpses on heaps in very large houses, and shut them up 
therein." 137 

" Manneus, the son of Lazarus, came running to Titus, . . . and 
told him that there had been carried out through that one gate which 
had been intrusted to his care, no fewer than one hundred and fifteen 
thousand, eight hundred and eighty dead bodies." 138 " Simon took the 
tower into his own custody, and seized upon these men [whom he sus- 
pected of treachery] , and put them to death in the sight of the Romans ; 
and when they had mangled their bodies, he threw them down before the 
wall of the city." 139 " Now the seditious at first gave orders that the dead 
should be buried out of the public treasury, as not enduring the stench 
of their dead bodies. But afterwards, when they could not do that, 
they cast them down from the walls into the valleys beneath." 14 ° 

e) " And they will not leave in thee one stone upon another, 
because thou Jcnewest not the day of thy visitation. For these 
are the da/ys of vengeance, that all things which are written may 
le fulfilled." 

The siege is drawing near its crisis and close. Josephus, 
himself a Jewish commander, but now captured „_ „ 

' r §377. Beginning 

yet allowed large privileges at the headquarters of the 

n ,t n i ', o Desolation. 

of the Koman army, becomes an eyewitness oi 

the final overthrow of the Jews at Jerusalem. In his Histories 



136 Wars, v, 12, 3. *« lb. v, 13, 7. i» lb. v, 13,7. i» lb. v, 13, 2, close. 
140J6. v, 12, 3, close. 



534 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

he says that, " This war began in the second year of the gov- 
ernment of Florus [as procurator], and the twelfth year of the 
reign of Nero," which was also the seventeenth year of Herod 
Agrippa II, corresponding to May A. D. 66. 141 It was in the 
month of July of that year that Titus made a night assault, 
surprising the Jews and capturing the castle Antonia. This 
was a great gain, making easy the early capture of the temple. 
On the seventeenth of the same month " the daily sacrifice 
failed at the altar of burnt-offerings, for the want of men to 
„ ~-~ « offer it ; and the people were grievously troubled 

§378. Sacrifices ' r r & J 

ceased at it." According to Whiston, this fact was the 
literal fulfillment of Daniel's prediction made 
606 years previously, but now the realization is brought to 
pass by Titus: " And for the half of the week he shall cause the 
sacrifice and the oblation to cease;" "for from the month of Feb- 
ruary, A. D. 66, about which time Vespasian entered on this 
war to this very time, was just three years and a half." On 
learning of the discontinuance of the Jews' sacrifice, Titus 
himself informed John, one of the Jewish chiefs, "that he 
might, if he pleased, offer the sacrifices which were discon- 
tinued, by any of the Jews whom he might pitch upon." He 
also had Josephus appeal to them in the same manner. But 
John* was incorrigible, and replied "that he never did fear the 
taking of the city, because it was God's own city." Josephus 
replied : 

" But thou hopest to have God for thy supporter in this war, whom 
thou hast deprived of his everlasting worship ; and thou imputest those 
sins to the Romans who at this very time, take care to have our laws 
observed, and almost compel those sacrifices to be offered to God which 
by thy means have been intermitted." 142 

*The three Jewish chieftains were Simon son of Gioras, who commanded 
fifteen thousand men occupying Mount Zion; John of Gischola, with six thousand 
Sicarii or robbers and others, occupied Acra on the north, and the outer temple 
courts; while Eleazar son of Simon, the treasurer of the temple, commanded two 
thousand four hundred men in the inner courts of the temple. These three camps 
were implacable in hate for each other, and fought desperately when not engaged 
with the Romans, their common enemy. 

i« Ant. xx, 11, 1; see Lard. vi. p. 407. 

us Wars, vi, 2, 1, and notes; comp. Dan. ix, 27. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the Nbw Testament. 535 

Now it is a marvelous fact that the Mosaic sacrifices have 
never been resumed, from the seventeenth of July A. D. 70 
until this day ! 

Josephus relates: " So Titus retired to the tower Antonia, resolved 
to storm the temple the next day early in the morning with his whole 
army, and to encamp round the Holy House. But as for 
that house, God had for certain doomed it to the fire ; ^Jjf 79 ' Tiie 
and now the fatal day was come, according to the revolu- Burned, 
tion of the ages. It was the tenth day of the month Lous 
[Ab, i. e., August] upon which it was formerly burnt by the king of 
Babylon." ( B. 0. 588; viz., Nebuchadnezzar; and also B. C. 63, by 
Pompey the Great.) 143 

The storming party of the Eomans were successful in cap- 
turing the sacred grounds, and all hope of the Jews died in 
them. 144 In their fright, they forsook their own walls which 
seemed almost impregnable, upon which the battering rams of 
the enemy had thundered for six days without making any 
impression. 145 The contending factions, led by Simon and 
John, betook themselves to flight, but could not effect their 
escape owing to the wall and soldiery of the Romans surround- 
ing the city. Many concealed themselves in the caves and 
caverns beneath the temple and elsewhere, within the area of 
the outer walls. The streets and houses were filled with the 
dead everywhere. The spectacle was that of complete desola- 
tion and solitude created in the midst of a city ; so that in the 
final onset, when the Romans mounted the ramparts, they were 
amazed at the silence and ruin which had been wrought by 
famine, flames, and death. 146 All that was now left for the 
Jews to do, was for each one to make the best terms he could 
for his own surrender. 

In noting these events, Dion Cassius remarks " a certain 
superstitious respect" which the Jews entertained for the walls 
of the temple, who thought " themselves happy in being em- 
ployed to fight for their temple, or die near it ;" but that when 
they saw their sanctuary in flames, 

i« Wars, vi, 4, 5. »«* 26. vl, 4, 2, *« j&. vl, 4, 1 ; vi, 8, 4. "« lb. vi, 8, 5. 



536 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

" Some surrendered themselves, some yielded to be killed, some 
cast themselves into the fire; "and it was truly imagined by all, but 
especially by those persons [interested], that it was not death, but to be 
both a victory and a deliverance and a complete happiness that they 
might perish along with the temple. And, at all events, so truly others 
were captured, even bar-Gioras their leader ; and, indeed, he alone in the 
triumphal procedures was punished with death. So assuredly Jerusalem 
was utterly destroyed on that day of Saturn [i. e., Saturday], which even yet 
now do the Jews reverence."* 

§380 jerusa- ^e c *ty itself, however, was captured the 
iem captured, gth day of September, A. D. 69. f Josephus 
now expresses this melancholy reflection : 

" A city that had been subject to so many miseries during the siege 
that, had it always enjoyed as much happiness from its first foundation, 
it would have certainly been the envy of the world. Nor did it on any 
other account so much deserve the sore misfortune as by producing such 
a generation of men as were the occasion of this overthrow." 147 

Suetonius mentions that Titus, having been left by his 
father Yespasian to " finish the reduction of Judaea, in his final 
assault of Jerusalem, . . . took it upon his daughter's 
birthday." 148 

The city of Jerusalem was now left in shapeless ruins. 

The temple, with its wealth of associations and treasures of 

gold, was reduced to ashes. The whole aspect 

§381. Jerusa- 6 \ 

iem a of the sacred courts was a dreary desolation. 
Desolation, rj^ magnificence of those buildings, once pointed 
out so admiringly by the disciples of Christ, and those others 
which adorned "Mount Zion, beautiful for situation, the joy 
of the whole earth, on the sides of the north,'' had forever dis- 
appeared, "like the baseless fabric of a vision, leaving not a 
rack behind." Those massive walls which surrounded and 
divided the city were leveled to the ground, excepting a por- 
tion on the western side, and the three most powerful towers, 

*K<x2 eddicet, iraffi fxkv } fidXtara 8e iicdpoi? o$x $ Tt SXeOpo?, dXXa icai vckt], kclI 
(TOtiTrjpta, evdaifiovla re eivai, Stl tc£ vai>) (tvpixtoWoivto. 'EdXwcra^ 5' odv icai &? 
SXkoL T€, icai 6 Bapiropdg- 6 &px<*>v axndv nal fx6po? ye ovto? iv toi? iirivudoi? 
eKo\a<rdr). ovtco /xev to, 'Iepo<r6\v(xa ev airy ttj tov Kp6vov rjp-^pg., fy /JLaXurra en 
/ecu vvv 'IouScuoi <re'(3ov<Tt.v, ei-ibXero. (Lib. lxvi, Vespas. §£ 6, 7. 

•}- Suetonius' Lives of the Caesars, Titus, p. 469, Note 1. 

i« Wars, vi, 8, 5. i« Titus, v. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 537 

which had proved to be absolutely impregnable, known as 
Mariamne, Phasael, and Hippicus, which are still standing 
near the gate Yaffa. These had belonged to Herod's palace. 
After the conquest, these were left purposely as monuments of 
the complete reduction of the city and the nation. 149 Every- 
where throughout the city, in its lanes and streets and courts; 
underneath, in its subterraneous regions ; above ground, in the 
palaces and homes; outside the walls, and down along the 
surrounding valleys and ravines, — were found, in heaps and 
scattering, the bodies of the dead and the dying. 

The victorious Romans now brought their standards, sur- 
mounted by the detested eagles, into the courts of the temple, 
and, placing them over against the eastern gate, 
proceeded to make their customary sacrificial Abomination 
offerings in thanksgiving for the conquest ° esolatlon - 
achieved. 150 Then was realized the predicted "abomination 
of desolation standing in the holy place." " They placed their 
ensigns upon the towers, and made joyful acclamations for the 
victory they had gained, as having found the end of the 
war. 151 And to complete their expression of admiration for 
their commander, the soldiers assumed to bestow upon Titus 
the title of Imperator. It was merely a complimentary title, 
for his father Yespasian, under whose authority he was acting, 
was at that time the emperor. 

Centuries before the event, Daniel the prophet « 383 Titug 
had forecast the situation as at length it devel- and God- 
oped in history. He predicted that — 

" The people of the prince that shall come, shall destroy the city and 
the sanctuary, and the end thereof shall be [as] with a flood, and even unto 
the end shall be war. Desolations are determined. He shall cause the 
sacrifice and the oblation to cease; and upon the wing of abominations 
shall come one that maketh desolate ; and even unto the consummation 
. . . shall wrath be poured out upon the desolate." 162 

Titus now had occasion and time to survey the situation as 
wrought by famine, pestilence, and war ; not only the desola- 

™Wars, vii, 1, 1. ™Ib. vi, 6, 1. ™lb. vi, 8, 5. i« Dan. ix, 26, 27. 



538 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

tion effected by the Romans, but that effected within the city 
by the deadly strifes 1 of the three camps under the leadership 
of Simon, John, and Eleazar. Nothing remained but "the 
tattered fragments of departed glory." When he witnessed 
the ruin and destruction of the city and the temple, — 

"He gave a groan, and spreading out his hands to heaven, called 
God to witness that this was not his [own] doing;" 153 that "he cer- 
tainly had God for his assistant in this war-/' 154 that "he had himself 
not done this great work," but " only lent a hand in the service of God 
when he was pleased to show his displeasure toward that nation ; " 155 
and that " it was God who put down by force the Jews from their 
defenses." 166 

An eloquent Roman lawyer of an early Christian century, 
named Minucius Felix, refers the Roman people to Josephus, 
but also to Antonius Julianus, a Roman author and historian 
of this Roman- Jewish war, as one 

"From whom they might learn that the Jews had not been ruined, 
nor abandoned of God, until they first had abandoned him ; and that 
their present low condition was owing to their [own] wickedness and 
obstinacy therein ; and that nothing had happened to them but what had 
been foretold." 157 

" They will not leave in thee one stone upon another." The 

depth of meaning here intended may now receive considera. 

ation. This Roman-Jewish war was virtually 

§384. Christ's J 

Prediction ended when Jerusalem was captured and de- 
stroyed. A few frontier fortresses to which the 
Jews in flight found refuge remained, and were not all taken 
until the year 73. Meantime Jerusalem was razed to the 
ground. Josephus witnesses that — 

" Caesar resolved to leave there as a guard the tenth legion, with 
certain troops of horsemen and companies of footmen." "Its wall was so 
thoroughly laid even with the ground by those that dug it up to the founda- 
tion, that there was left nothing to make those that came thither believe it had 
ever been inhabited. This was the end which Jerusalem came to by the 

™Wars, v, 12, 4. "475. V i, 9, 1. 

^Philostratus de Vit. 1, 6, c. 29, cited by Lard, vi, 478. 

166 '0 9e6f fjp 6 rQvde ipv/xdrcov' lovdaiov? Kadek&v, Wars, vi, 9, 1; cf. vi, 8, 5. 

iw Cited by Lard, vi, 477. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the ]STew Testament. 539 

madness of those that were for innovations — a city otherwise of great 
magnificence and of mighty fame among mankind." 158 

Eusebius records : 

"All this occurred in this manner, in the second year of the reign of 
Vespasian, according to the predictions of our Lord and Savior Jesus 
Christ, who, by his Divine power, foresaw all these things as if already 
present at the time, who wept and mourned indeed at the prospect as 
the holy Evangelists show in their writings.' ' " How can one fail to ac- 
knowledge and wonder at the truly divine and extraordinary foreknowl- 
edge and prediction of our Savior? Concerning the events, then, that 
befell the Jews after our Savior's passion, and those outcries in which 
the multitude of the Jews refused the condemnation of a robber and 
murderer, but entreated that the Prince of Life should be destroyed, it 
is superfluous to add to the statement of the historian [Josephus]." 
"The occasion of their being so great a multitude of people at Jerusa- 
lem . . . was, that it was the time of the Passover, for which reason 
the Jews, having come up from all parts to worship at the temple, were 
shut in the city as in a prison. And indeed it was fit that they should be 
slain at the same time [i. e., at the Passover time] in which they crucified 
our Savior." 159 

Centuries before these calamities were realized, God's proph- 
ets had voiced to this people how that the Divine indignation 
was unmistakably kindled against them, foretelling the doom 
which would certainly overtake them if they persisted in their 
wickedness. Precisely what did occur was that which was pre- 
dicted with marvelous circumstantiality. Jeremiah, quoting 
the words of Micah, said : 

" Micah the Morasthite prophesied in the days of Hezekiah, King of 
Judah, and spake to all the people of Judah, saying: Thus saith the Lord of 
hosts : Zion shall be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps; 
and the mountain of the house [of God] as the high places of the forest." 160 

As to the fulfillment of this repeated prediction of the 

prophets, confirmation is given by the Talmudists, who were 

adverse witnesses, who refer to a certain Roman captain 

named Turnus, but called in the Talmud Terentius Rufus, who 

was left with a guard in charge of Jerusalem in ruins. The 

Talmud reads : 

" On the ninth [of the month] Av, five things happened: It was de- 
creed in the wilderness that Israel should not enter into the land [of 

™Wars, vii, 1, 1, 2. ^Chronicles, 162. "0 j er . xxvi, 18; Mic. lil, 12. 



540 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



promise]. The temple was destroyed both the first and the second time. 
The great city Bither was taken, t and there were in it thousands and tens 
of thousands of Israel ; and they had a great king, whom all Israel and 
the greatest of the wise men imagined to be King Messiah. He fell 
into the hands of the Gentiles, "and the Israelites were slain ; and there 
was a great affliction similar to the desolation of the temple. On the 
same day destined for punishment, the wicked Turnus Rufus plowed up 
the sanctuary and the adjacent parts, to fulfill that which is said: Zion shall 
be plowed as a field." 161 

„ _. Edward Gibbon, in his celebrated history of 

§385. Witness ' J 

of infidels. the Eoman Empire, on the downfall of Jerusa- 
lem and its destruction by Titus and Hadrian, says : 

" A part of the hill distinguished by the name of Moriah, and leveled 
by human industry, was crowned with the stately temple of the Jewish 
nation. After the final destruction of the temple by the arms of Titus 
and Hadrian, a plowshare was drawn over the consecrated ground, as 
the sign of perpetual interdiction. Zion was deserted ; and the vacant 
space of the lower city [Mt. Moriah] was filled with the public and pri- 
vate edifices of the iElian colony, which spread^themselves over the 
adjacent hill of Calvary. The holy places were polluted with monu- 
ments of idolatry ; and, either from design or accident, a chapel was 
dedicated to Venus on the spot which had been sanctified by the death 
and resurrection of Christ." 162 

Yolney, one of the extremest of the schools of disbelief, 
who traversed the lands of the Bible to discover, if possible, 
evidence with which to invalidate the Scriptures, thus testifies 
respecting the condition of Judaea : 

"I have traversed this desolate country. ... I wandered over 
the country ; I enumerated the kingdoms of Damascus and Idumsea, of 
Jerusalem and Samaria." " Great God! from whence proceed such melan- 
choly revolutions f For what cause is the fortune of these countries so 
strikingly changed ? Why are so many cities destroyed ? Why is not 
that ancient population reproduced and perpetuated ? . . . Why 
have these favors been transferred, as it were, for so many ages, to other 
nations and different climes? . . . Within two thousand and five 
hundred years we reckon ten invasions, which have introduced in Syria 
a succession of foreign nations." ..." God has doubtless pronounced 
a secret malediction against the land!" 163 

i«i Talmud in Hilchoth Taanioth, c. v, on Mic. iii, 12. 

i«2Milman's ed. of Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ii, 826: Porter and 
Coates's ed., Phila., 1845. 

168 See Keith's Demonstr. of Truth and Christianity, pp. 23, 24, 26, etc. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 541 

No, not a "secret malediction," but a most public one, pre- 
announced in prophecy, literally fulfilled in history, and the 
whole land is now a standing monument of Divine indignation 
against an apostate and incorrigible nation ! It is the terrible 
retribution of God upon the ancient Jews, brought upon them- 
selves by the high-handed wickedness of that nation which cul- 
minated in the rejection and crucifixion of Jesus Christ; a 
punishment which he foretold would come to pass in that 
very generation ! Jesus himself foretold : 

"These are days of vengeance, that all things which are written 
maybe fulfilled." 164 For ''Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the 
Lord." 165 " For the nation and kingdom that will not serve thee, shall 
perish : yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted." 166 

£) "And they shall fall by the edge of the sword; and 
§386. they shall be led captive into all the nations; and Jerusa- 
lem shall be trodden down by the Gentiles, until the time 
of the Gentiles be fulfilled." m 
This part of Christ's prediction contains three averments ; 
namely, the killed in battle, the prisoners captured, and Jeru- 
salem trodden down by the Gentiles. We shall see that these 
particulars were realized to the letter. Josephus* estimates 
the number of Jews assembled at Jerusalem in A. D. 65, when 
Cestius Gallus attempted the first siege, to have been three 
millions gathered from all lands to the festival of the Pass- 
over. According to the careful computation of Milman, there 
perished of the Jews — 

In different cities prior to the siege at Jesusalem, - - 129,500 

And, besides, during the war conducted in Galilee and Judaea, 118,300 
At Jerusalem, by siege, battles between the Jews, famines, 

and pestilence, - - 1,100,000 

After the fall of Jerusalem, at the several forts of the frontier, 8,660 

Total, 1,356,460 

Number of prisoners taken at the end of the siege, 97,000 
Prisoners taken at Gischala and the Jordan, - 4,700 

101,700 

Grand total, 1,458,160 

><*Luke xxi, 22. "5 Rom. xii, 19. »«• Isa. lx, 12. w Luke xxi, 24. 

* Wars, vi, 9, 3. 
35 



542 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Besides, ninety-seven thousand captives were sold into sla- 
very. The aged and infirm who survived the siege were slain. 
Those whose age was seventeen and above were put into bonds 
and sent to the mines of Egypt ; while others were sent away 
to Caesarea, to Berytus (Beyroot), and Antioch in Syria, and 
to other cities, to be entered in the amphitheater, to be killed 
by each other or by skilled gladiators, or to be thrown to the 
wild beasts, as a holiday spectacle ^to entertain and amuse the 
half-civilized populace of that region. But a special reserva- 
tion was made of the tallest and handsomest young men, 
together with those regarded as the chieftains in the rebel- 
lion — such as John of Gischala, and Simon son of Gioras — to 
grace the triumph of Titus at Rome. The number of these 
prisoners is that reported by Josephus from only three places ; 
but there were others not included here. He adds : 

"They left only the populace, and sold the rest of the multitude 
with their wives and children ; and every one of them at a very low 
price ; and that because such as were sold were very many, and the buy- 
ers were very few." 168 

These cruelties, which are beyond compare, were then jus- 
tified by the rules of ancient warfare. Upon the other hand, 
the two alternatives were conspicuously placed before all 
Israel while yet in the wilderness. Moses taught and edu- 
cated the people : 

"And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the 
voice of the Lord thy God, to observe to do all his commandments which 
I command thee this day, that the Lord thy God will set thee on high 
above all nations of the earth." " If thou wilt not observe to do all the 
words of this law that are written in this book, that thou mayest fear 
this glorious and fearful name, THE LOED THY GOD ; ... ye 
shall be left few in number, whereas ye were as the stars of heaven for 
multitude; because thou wouldst not obey the voice of the Lord thy 
God." "And the Lord shall scatter thee among all people, from one end 
of the earth to the other, . . . and among these nations shalt thou 
find no ease, neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest ; but the Lord 
shall give thee a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and sorrow of mind : 
and thy life shall hang in doubt before thee ; and thou shalt fear by day 

lee Wars, vi, 8, 2. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 543 

and night, and shalt have none assurance of thy life ; in the morning 
thou shalt say, Would God it were even! and at even thou shalt say, 
"Would God it were morning ! for fear of thine heart wherewith thou 
shalt fear, and for the sight of thine eyes which thou shalt see. And the 
Lord shall bring thee into Egypt again with ships, by the way whereof 
I spake unto thee : Thou shalt see it no more again : and there ye shall 
be sold unto your enemies for bondmen and bondwomen, and no man shall 
buy you [back]." 

"The generation to come of your children that shall rise up after 
you, and the stranger that shall come from a far land, . . . even all 
the nations, shall say: Wherefore hath the Lord done this unto this 
land ? What meaneth the heat of this anger ? Then shall men say : Be- 
cause they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord God of their fathers." 169 

Since the time of the destruction of Jerusalem, there have 

been Jewish communities, but no Jewish nation or State. 

From those days until now, neither Jerusalem nor Judaea has 

ever been in possession of the Jews. The country has changed 

ownership frequently; for first it was held by the Eomans 

who had conquered it ; then by the Saracens who overran it ; 

afterwards by the Franks ; then by the Mamelukes ; and now 

it is governed by the Turks who belong to the Mohammedan 

religion. The Divine prediction had its verification in that 

generation : 

" For in those days there shall be tribulation, such as there hath not been 
from the beginning of the creation which God hath created until now, and 
never shall be." 170 " There shall be great distress upon the land, and wrath 
unto this people ; and they shall fall by the edge of the sword ; and they 
shall be led captive into all the nations ; and Jerusalem shall be trodden 
down of the Gentiles, until the time of the Gentiles shall be fulfilled"' 1 ' 11 

If, now, it should be asked, Why should this indignation 
of God be judicially visited upon this particular " generation " 
rather than another? the reminder should be 

§387. Retribu- 

made that this generation had the advantages tion on that 
of more light than all the others; the accumu- 
lated teachings of all prior generations for two thousand years 
were theirs, and not one generation with less instruction was 
so incorrigibly wicked. The culmination of all wickedness 

"9 Deut. xxviii, 1, 58, 62-68; xxix, 22, 24, 25. wo Mark xiii, 19. 

in Luke xxi, 23, 24. 



544 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

occurred in this generation as in no other, when Jesus "came 
unto his own, and his own received him not," 1T2 but when 
"this generation" of both nation and rulers perpetrated the 
unparalleled crime against the life of the Christ of God whom 
they crucified as the vilest criminal. For let it not be forgot> 
ten that, after all the miracles which attested his Divine Son- 
ship, he at last wrought the stupendous miracle in their pres- 
ence in raising Lazarus from the dead, their only response 
was that they sought to kill both Jesus and Lazarus ; for they 
said : " If we let him alone, all men will believe on him, and 
the Romans will come and take away our place and na- 
tion." m It was " this generation " of both rulers and people 
who openly committed the deathless infamy of preferring 
the release of Barabbas, who was a murderer, that the Son of 
God should be tortured by his death on the cross! Falsely 
professing loyalty to the Roman Emperor, with one voice 
they cried out to Pilate: "We have no king but Caesar; if 
thou release this man, thou art not Caesar's friend ; every one 
that maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar!" 
Against Pilate's repeated protest, "All the people answered: 
His blood he upon us, and on our children."™ Their fearful 
imprecation was granted. They preferred Caesar's rule to 
that of Christ, and to Caesar's rule they were relegated. Is 
not the horrid imprecation of the Jews before Pilate the 
sufficient and supreme answer to the question why God's retri- 
bution fell upon that particular generation? He who is "King 
of the nations" 175 "shall judge among the nations." 176 The 
abrupt but complete turning point between the dispensation 
of the Old and New Testament had now come. The siege of 
Jerusalem in its succession of events is significant of " God in 
History." The siege began at the time of the Passover, the 
anniversary of the crucifixion of Christ ; at the time when the 
predicted " sacrifice and oblation should cease," which was the 



mjohn i, 11. m lb. xl, 48; xli, 10, 11. 

m John xix, 12; Matt, xxvll, 25. "6 j e r. x, 7. " 6 Psa. ii, 4, 6; vii, 8; ix, 8. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 545 

abolishment of the Jews' whole sacrificial system; the oc- 
casion in which their ancient temple was burned to the 
ground, the utter extinction of their revered center of wor- 
ship; on a Saturday r , the abolition of the Jewish Sabbath; 
the reduction and destruction of " the Holy City " Jerusalem ; 
and, withal, the expatriation of the Jewish people from their 
native Palestine ; that which finally terminated the existence 
of their ancient theocracy ! It stands forever as the answer 
to all questions, and for the understanding of all the genera- 
tions to come, that that generation of the Jews in which Jesus 
Christ lived and died, in their frenzied outcry for the cruci- 
fixion of the "Lord of Glory'''' invoked upon themselves the hor- 
rible malediction: " His Mood be on us, and on our children!" 
The revenge of History was but too fully accomplished. It 
was the vindication of God. And the Gentile world ever 
since has read, with wonder and profound sympathy, the story 
of these calamities endured, which ended in the blotting out 
from the great family of nations, and the removal from the 
geography of the world, the nationality and commonwealth 
of the ancient Jews of Palestine. From that day forth, His- 
tory was changed in its course. 

It is indeed a sad but historical record of the Divine 
procedure, but one which had been tearfully but faithfully 
portrayed by Christ himself. It was also long preceded by 
the longsuffering and "patience of Christ," which should not 
be lost sight of when taking an account of the memorabilia 
related to his sufferings. 
These are : 

1. The Sympathy of Jesus : "And when he drew nigh he saw the city, 

and wept over it." 

2. The Visitation op God : " These are the days of vengeance . . . and 

wrath unto this people." 

3. By Methods op War: "Jerusalem compassed by armies . . . know 

her desolation is at hand." « 

4. Excruciating Sufferings: "Hath not been the like from creation, 

and never shall be." 



546 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

5. The Destruction of the Temple: "Behold, your house is left unto 

you desolate." 

6. The Escape op the Christians: "And not a hair of your heads 

shall perish." 

7. The Overthrow op the City: " Jerusalem shall be trodden down of 

the Gentiles." 

8. The Condition of Survivors: "And they shall be led captive into all 

the nations." 

9. The Perversity of the Jews: "Because thou knowest not the days 

of thy visitation." 
10. The Christians Emancipated: "Lift up your head, because your 
redemption draweth nigh." 

The Roman triumph is the sequel of this conquest, involv- 
ing further humiliating sufferings on the part of the Jews. 
o~™ m ^ m . The Senate at Rome ordered a triumph to be 

§388. TheTri- ^ 

umpn and its awarded in honor of each, Yespasian and his son 
Titus. They themselves, however, chose that 
there should be but one occasion, in which they should share 
jointly. The triumph was celebrated in the next year, A. D. 
71. Milman thus describes the expenditure and splendor of 
the pageantry: 

" Nothing could equal the splendor of the triumph which Vespasian 
shared with his son Titus for their common victories. Besides the usual 
display of treasures, gold, silver, jewels, purple vests, the rarest wild 
beasts from all quarters of the globe, there were extraordinary pa- 
geants, three or four stories high, representing to the admiration and 
delight of those civilized savages, all the horrors and miseries of war, — 
beautiful countries laid waste; armies slain, routed, led captive; cities 
breached by military engines, stormed, destroyed by fire and sword ; 
women wailing ; houses overturned ; temples burning, and rivers of fire 
flowing through regions no longer cultivated or peopled, but blazing 
away into the long and dreary distance. Among the spoils, the golden 
table, the seven-branched candlestick, and the Book of the Law from 
the temple of Jerusalem, were conspicuous." 177 

The triumphal procession was most impressive in its ap- 
pointments. Yespasian and Titus appeared as conquerors. 
Each clad in the ancient purple, each crowned with laurel, 
each riding in his own chariot, accompanied by Domitian 
mounted upon his blooded steed, moved slowly along the Sacred 

i" Hist, of Jews, ii, 389. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 547 

Way, amidst the joyful acclamations of the Roman people. 
Before them had already passed the victorious army; the sol- 
diers without their arms, clad in festive silk, followed by- 
seven hundred selected and reserved captives of the war. In 
accordance with the ancient custom, the triumphal procession 
paused and waited at the temple Jupiter Capitolanus, which 
marked the end of the victorious march, to hear announced the 
death of the general of the conquered army. This distinction 
was awarded to Simon, son of Gioras, who commanded the Jews 
and Idumaeans on Mount Zion in the great revolt, who, with a 
rope about his neck, was dragged to the place of his execu- 
tion, whipped as he went along the highway in public expos- 
ure. Upon reaching the famous Tarpeian rock, he was hurled 
therefrom headlong to his death, and the fact was reported 
and announced to the conquering Romans. John of Gischala 
was doomed to perpetual imprisonment. And for the occasion 
of triumph coins were struck bearing the legend: "Judoea 
capta, Judoea conquered" 118 

In addition to all this, there was erected in Rome a monu- 
mental arch of Pentelic marble, constructed in most beautiful 
design, known now as the Arch of Titus. Of all the antiqui- 
ties preserved in the Old World capital, this arch is unrivaled 
in Christian interest. After the death of Titus in A. D. 81, 
his brother Domitian, who succeeded him to the imperial 
throne, caused this monument of triumph to be erected to 
commemorate his victory over the Jews and the destruction of 
their State. It yet stands on the old street known as Su?nma 
Sacra Via, or the highest part of the Sacred Way, between 
the Forum and the Coliseum. It is that street which extends 
from the southern gate of Rome to the Capitol, over which the 
Roman conquerors were wont to move in triumphal proces- 
sions, the royal captives being chained to the triumphal 
chariots, drawn by four horses, accompanied by the spoils of 

"8 Judcea capta, Judoea devicta. 



548 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

war as trophies. A translation of the inscription on the Arch 
of Titus reads thus : 

THE SEi*ATE 

AND PEOPLE OF ROME 

TO THE DEIFIED TITUS VESPANIANUS AUOTTSTTTS 

THE SON OF 

THE DEIFIED VESPANIANUS.* 

This Arch of Triumph still survives the wastes and dan- 
gers of time, and its inscription tells its own story. Its 
moldering entablature in part represents the procession tri- 
umphal, and the sacred furniture taken from the temple of Jeru- 
salem, as borne along over the pavement with measured step, 
displaying the spoils of war to the Roman peoples ; the images 
of their gods preceding ; the shew-bread, the silver trumpets 
which announced the year of jubilee, the seven-branched can- 
dlesticks of massive gold, the vessels of incense, and the roll of 
the Law. The only representation of those sacred vessels now 
existing, aside from the written description by Moses, is that 
sculptured in relief in entablature placed on the inside of this 
monumental arch. The Book of the Law and the veils of the 
Holy Place do not appear on the arch, but were deposited in 
the palace of the emperor ; all the other articles were placed 
in the Temple of Peace, which was burned in the time of 
Commodus, who was emperor A. D. 180-192. 

Of the Jews' survival and pertinacity of ex- 

§389. Sur- . r J 

vivai of istence, Dr. Philip Schaff makes the following 
the Jews. pointed reiIiar ks: 

" Thus, therefore, must one of the best of the Roman emperors ex- 
ecute the long threatened judgment of God, and the most learned Jew 
of his time describe it, and thereby, without willing or knowing it, 
[both] bear testimony to the truth of the prophecy and the Divinity of the 
mission of Jesus Christ, the rejection of whom brought all this and the 
subsequent misfortunes upon the apostate race." 179 " But the Jews still 



*SENATV8 PpPVLVOVB. ROMANVS. DlVO. TlTO. DlVI. VESPASIANI. F. VES- 
PASIANO. AVGVSTO. 

wffist. Christ. Church, i, 399. 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 549 

had the Law and the Prophets and sacred traditions, to which they cling 
to this day with indestructible tenacity, and with the hope of a great 
future. Scattered over the earth, at home everywhere and nowhere ; re- 
fusing to mingle their blood with any other race ; dwelling in distant 
communities ; marked as a peculiar people in every feature of the coun- 
tenance, in every rite of their religion ; patient, sober, and industrious ; 
successful in every enterprise ; prosperous in spite of oppression ; ridi- 
culed, and yet feared ; robbed, yet wealthy ; massacred, yet springing 
up again, — they have outlived the persecution of the centuries, and are 
likely to live till the end of time, the object of mingled contempt, 
admiration, and the wonder of the world/' 180 

THE REVIEW. 

The evidential value of our Lord's prophecy uttered on the 
Mount of Olives can not be overestimated. The prediction is 
so circumstantially stated, and the fulfillment 
was in such exact agreement with the prediction, § 390 -. The Pre- 
that some have quite insisted that the Evangel- 
ists did not record these successive events while they yet per- 
tained to the future, but afterward, when they had become 
identified with the past ; not prophecy, but history. Of course, 
no proof is offered, as it is mere conjecture. But it concedes 
and certifies the complete accordancy between the foretelling 
and the fulfilling of the prediction. O bviously, on the ground 
assumed, it would be impossible to verify any prophecy what- 
ever, since the more circumstantially accordant the prophecy 
and the history, the more evident would be the attempted 
fraud ! In other words, only such predictions as do not corre- 
spond with the realization could be entitled to consideration as 
true! Such assumptions would destroy all canon of belief, 
from sheer absurdities. 

But the internal evidence of the case contravenes and de- 
stroys any such objections to the record of the Evangelists. 
For the prediction publishes certain signs of warning which 
are to be observed by the Christians of Judaea, with directions 
when and how to escape the impending horrors of the siege ; 
viz, "When ye see Jerusalem compassed by armies, then know 

180 Hist. Christ. Church, i, 402. 



550 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

that her desolation is at hand. Then let them that are in 
Juda?a flee to the mountains, and let them that are in the midst 
of her depart out," etc. Now if the prediction be conceived 
as an imposture, what possible design could the writer have 
entertained to insert at all the admonition given, and the 
direction respecting the time and manner of escape, after the 
event had already passed? But, on the other hand, if the 
Christians, and they alone, were in possession of the admoni- 
tion, and conformed their conduct to the directions, then it 
must have been exactly because they possessed the admonition 
and prediction before the occurrence of the event. It was 
said: "Not a hair of your head shall perish." Not a single 
Christian suffered from the siege. And to this fact all the 
historical circumstances of the case correspond with extraor- 
dinary exactness. Upon every reasonable ground, therefore, 
the supposition which attempts to deny the reality of Christ's 
prediction, as such, is inadmissible. 

The destruction of Jerusalem involving the destruction of 
the theocracy, was that which was to be accomplished in that 
S39i The generation. Both were to fall by the judicial 
Realization, judgment of God, whose occasion is designated as 
"the day of vengeance." And in that character it came to 
pass. Armies encompassed the city as foretold; banks and 
walls were constructed about Jerusalem, to confine the Jews 
within the siege ; people fell by the edge of the sword by the 
ten thousand ; the temple where the nation for centuries had 
gathered to observe all the rites of worship was reduced to 
ashes; the foundations thereof were so uptorn that not one 
stone was left upon another; the surviving people became cap- 
tives in war, but slaves in peace; and the Holy City, the joy 
of many generations, became literally trodden down by the 
Gentiles ! What calamities were involved in this stupendous 
fulfillment of prophecy ! Can conviction rest satisfied in the 
belief that all this cumulative suffering, and the final extinction 
of this great and ancient nation, were but a commonplace oc- 



Jewish Nation in Times of the New Testament. 551 

currence in history, having no significant relation to the provi- 
dence and government of God? The complete and permanent 
obliteration of a whole nation from the face of the world — 
and that by far the most religiously-instructed people of their 
time, who had for centuries past regarded themselves as God's 
peculiar people — is an effect which all just reasoning demands 
that the cause and occasion should be explained. Those who 
reject this explanation should furnish a better one. For the 
whole course of history was changed by the results of that 
war. 

Set aside, now, the several prophecies related to this oc- 
casion, who will furnish the sufficient explanation ? Upon the 
other hand, if we accept the situation as we find it, we clearly 
have not far to go for the satisfactory answer. It is obvious 
that those most active in this war, as Titus, most familiar with 
its pivotal occurrences, are most clear in the discernment which 
attributes the whole issue to the retribution of God visited 
upon that apostate generation. The Jewish mind, the heathen 
mind, and the Christian mind have reached the same consen- 
sus. The captive Josephus, a captive in chains ; the conquering 
general, Titus, in command of the Roman army ; the Roman 
Julianus, an eyewitness and historian of the siege ; the Chris- 
tian writer, Eusebius, of a succeeding generation, in his Chron- 
icles ; and in modern times, the skeptical Gibbon in England, 
writing on the Roman Empire ; and the Atheist Yolney trav- 
ersing Palestine in researches for materials to refute the 
Scriptures, all concur in seeing the movement of God's hand 
visible behind the dark clouds whose vengeful bolt in one day 
blotted a nation from the geography of the earth. 

Much was meant in behalf of the Church which the Savior 
was founding, when he said : "When these things g 392 The 
begin to come to pass, look up and lift up your Advantages, 
heads, because your redemption draweth nigh." 

Of course, the apostles of Jesus were Jewish Christians. 
They had been regularly admitted to the Church of the Jews 



552 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

at a time when all the ancient rites of that Church were yet 
binding. No rule had been published, either by the authority 
of Christ or by the Jewish Church, prohibiting Christians from 
worshiping in the temple. Upon the other hand, these rites 
and services were powerfully enforced upon all Jews by re- 
ligious instinct, by education, and by legal requirement. 
Hence Christ's disciples continued their services at the temple 
long after the death of Jesus. There was nothing incompatible 
with duty, or inconsistent in conduct, involved in the disciples' 
observing such service. For while the death of Christ was 
itself sacrificial as the Antitype of the whole sacrificial system, 
and virtually abolished the necessity of subsequent sacrificing 
at the temple, yet as no authoritative utterance had been made, 
by Christ or the Christian or Jewish Church, prohibitive of 
such observances to the Jewish Christians, they naturally con- 
tinued the old ritual. The gospel was " to the Jew first," and 
associations in the same Jewish solemnities were most likely 
to win the Jews to the new faith of which the old observances 
were so illustrative. The Jewish ritual was allowable, but it 
was not obligatory. But in the ordering of God it was reserved 
for the seventeenth of July, A. D. 70, to bring in the one de- 
cisive measure, when, accordant with the prophecy of Daniel, 
all "sacrifice and oblation should cease;" and on the tenth of 
August the temple was burned,* and the theocracy was brought 
to an end. The point of complete and final separation between 
the Jews and Christians was now definitely reached. The 
Gentiles were not to be enslaved by the effete forms of Judaism, 
nor to be degraded in their freedom of spirit. There existed 
now no longer a common bond of unity between the old and 
the new Church ; but in a free spirit all Christians could " lift 
up their heads, because the day of their redemption" had 
come. 



* Alex. Thomson says that Jerusalem itself was captured and sacked on Sep- 
tember 8, A. D. 69, on the Sabbath (see Sueton., p. 417, note). 



Jewish Nation in Times^of the New Testament. 553 

On this point Dr. Schaff remarks with characteristic force 

and clearness : 

"The awful catastrophe of "the destruction of the Jewish theocracy- 
must have produced the profoundest sensation among the Christians, of 
which we now, in the absence of all particular information respecting it, 
can hardly form a true conception. It was the greatest calamity of 
Judaism, and a great benefit to Christianity ; a refutation of the one, a 
vindication and an emancipation of the other. It not only gave a mighty 
impulse to [the] faith, but at the same time formed a proper epoch in 
the history of the relation between the two religious bodies. It separated 
them forever. . . . God himself destroyed the house in which he had 
thus far dwelt ; in]which Jesus had taught ; in which the apostles had 
prayed. He rejected his peculiar people for their obstinate rejection of the 
Messiah; he demolished the whole fabric of the Mosaic theocracy, whose 
system of worship was in its very nature associated with the temple. 
. . . Henceforth the heathen could no longer look upon Christianity 
as a mere sect of Judaism, but must regard and treat it as a new, peculiar 
religion [of itself]. The destruction of Jerusalem, therefore, marks that 
momentous crisis at which the Christian Church, as a w^hole, burst for- 
ever from the chrysalis of Judaism, awoke to a sense of its own maturity, 
and, in government and worship, at once took its independent stand 
before the world." " This breaking away from the hardened Judaism 
and its religious forms involved no departure from the spirit of the Old 
Testament revelation." m 

"The ruin of Jerusalem was for Christianity an unequal 
fortune." 182 It was a change from the old Covenant to the 
New. It involved not the moral, but the whole ceremonial 
law. The change embraced services and people, conditions 
and admissions, Jews and Gentiles. The restriction of religion 
to one nation exclusively now completely ceased ; the extension 
of privileges equally and universally to all nations was now 
directly asserted. The result inured greatly to the advantage 
of Christianity. 

Bishop Westcott remarks : 

"The Christians of Jerusalem had clung to their ancient law till 
their national hopes seemed crushed forever by the building of ^lia, and 
the establishment of a Gentile Church within the Holy City. At length 
men saw that they were already in the new age — the world to come ; 
they saw the kingdom of heaven, as distinguished from the typical king- 
dom of Israel, was now set up ; and it seemed that the Gospel of St. Paul 

i8i Hist. Christ. Church, i, 403, 404. iss R6nan. 



554 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

was to be the common law of its citizens. Under the pressure of these 
circumstances the Judaizing party naturally made a last effort to regain 
their original power. It was only possible to maintain what had ceased 
to be national by asserting that it was universal. The discussions of the 
first age were thus reproduced in form, but they had a wider bearing. 
The struggle was not for independence, but for dominion. The Gentile 
Christians no longer claimed tolerance, but supremacy." 183 

The same writer sets forth the removal of the distinctions 
between the Jew and the Gentile in the following particulars : 

a. " The admission of the Gentiles to the Christian Church. (Acts 
x, xi.) 

b. The freedom of the Gentile converts from the Ceremonial law. 
(Acts xv.) 

c. The indifference of the Ceremonial law for Jewish converts. (Gal. 
ii, 14-16.) 

d. The incompatibility of Judaism and Christianity." 
183 Canon of the New Testament, 67, 68. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

PAUL'S MISSIONAEY JOUKKEYS TO THE GENTILE 

WOULD. 

I. The Histoeical Geography of the Book op Acts. 
II. Paul's Journey to the Gentile Countries. 

1. The Apostle Visits Asiatic Cities. 

a) Damascus (in Syria). 

/3) Ephesus (in Asia Minor). 

2. The Apostle Visits European Cities. 

a) Philippi (in Macedonia). 
/3) Thessalonica (in Macedonia). 
7) Athens (inAchai'a). 
III. Paul's Journey by Sea to Italy. 

a) The Apostle's Voyage (Mediterranean Sea). 
/S) His Shipwreck at Melita (Malta). 
7) Puteoli, the Italian Harbor (Pozzuoli). 
IV. Paul's Residence at Rome. 

a) In Bonds in his " own hired house." 
/S) Immured in the Mamertine Prison. 
7) His Death at the Three Fountains. 
555 



Map 1. 




Chapter XVIII. 

PAUL'S MISSIONAKY JOTJKKEYS TO THE GENTILE 

WORLD. 

§ 393. Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 

It is said that twelve fishermen founded Christianity. I will show you 
that one Frenchman can overthrow it. — Voltaire. 

By the beginning of the nineteenth century, Philosophy will triumph, 
and Christianity will fade away. — Hume. 

It is the Bible, the Bible itself, which combats and triumphs most effica- 
ciously in the war between incredulity and belief. — Guizot. 

In the Parables of the Mustard-seed and the Leaven, Jesus depicted the 
small beginnings and the future extent and power of the Christian 
religion. What a gaze was that which thus looked far down the 
stream of time ! The unaided faculties of no man in the situation 
of Jesus could have thus forecast the drama of history. — Fisher. 

Christ wrought through me, for the obedience of the Gentiles, by word 
and deed, in the power of signs and wonders, in the power of the 
Holy Spirit ; so that from Jerusalem, and round about even unto 
Illyricum, I have fully preached the gospel of Christ. So as much 
as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you also that are at 
Rome. — Paul. 

Now God be praised, that, to believing souls, 

Gives light in darkness, comfort in despair. — Shakespeare. 

ARGUMENT. 

The geography of the historical part of the New Testament is full of 
interest to the investigator, by reason of the lands and seas trav- 
ersed, the incidents occurring on the way and the circumstances 
under which the old civilizations, devoted to their idolatries, re- 
ceived the new Gospel of Christ. The Apostle of the Gentiles 
complies with the requirement of Jesus at his conversion : " Depart, 
for I will send thee far hence unto the Gentiles." He first visits 
the cities in Asia: Damascus in Syria, Jerusalem in Judaea, Ephe- 
sus in Asia Minor; then he introduces Christianity into Eastern 
Europe, establishing mission stations along the coast-line; at 
Philippi and Thessalonica, in Macedonia; and at Athens and 
Corinth, in Greece. 
36 557 



558 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

A prisoner, on his " appeal unto Csesar," he is conveyed from 
Csesarea-on-the-Sea to Eome under the special care of " a centurion 
named Julius of the Augustan band," a route which comparatively 
recently has been surveyed, and the whole journey in detail has 
been thoroughly established. The several islands, where the ship 
which carried the apostle touched in its course, have been fully 
identified ; the terrific storms encountered for " fourteen days and 
nights " still characterize the Mediterranean Sea ; the shipwreck on 
the island Melita (Malta), with the interesting incidents of their 
stay during winter ; Puteoli, the southern port of Italy, where he 
landed ; and thence on foot over the Appian Way to Rome,— are now 
all known to be historical. Entering the Capital a prisoner, the 
treatment the apostle received there, where he spent " two whole 
years in his own hired house, and received all that came unto him, 
preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching those things which 
concern the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence, no man forbid- 
ding him," and his subsequent trial and death, are all matters of 
note in this chapter. 

1. The Historical Geography of the Book of Acts. 

2. Paul's Visits to the Various Gentile Countries. 

3. The Apostle's Journey by Sea and Land to the Capital. 

4. The Occurrences, and Close of Paul's life at Rome. 

The folio wins: admirably condensed presenta- 

§394. The ° J r 

Historical tion of the Geography of the ~New Testament 
Geograp y. jj^Qp^ j s taken from the Bampton Lectures of 

the distinguished Professor George Bawlinson, 1 of Exeter 

College, England: 

"Among minute points of accordance, may be especially noticed the 
Geographical accuracy [of Luke]. 

"a) Compare the Divisions of Asia Minor mentioned in Acts with 
those of Pliny ; Phrygia, Galatia, Lycaonia, Cilicia, Pamphylia, Pisidia, 
Asia, Mysia, Bithynia, are all recognized as existing provinces by the 
Roman Geographer, writing probably within a few years of Luke. 2 

" /3) The Divisions of European Greece into two provinces, Macedonia, 
and Achai'a, 3 accords exactly with the arrangement of Augustus noticed 
in Strabo 4 [the famous ancient geographer] . 

il y) The various Tracts in or about Palestine belong to the geography 
of that time, and of no other. Judaea, Samaria, Galilee, Trichonitis, Itursea, 
Abilene, and Decapolis are recognized as geographically distinct at this 
period by Jewish and classic writers. 5 

" 5) The Routes mentioned are such as were in use at that time. 

i Bamp. Lects, 1859, Amer. ed., pp. 402, 403. 

2 Pliny, Historia Naturalis, v, 27. 3 Acts xix, 21. * Strabo, xvii, ad. fin. 

b Pliny, H. N. v,_14, 18, 23; Strab. xvi, 2, 10, 34; Joseph. Ant. xix, 5, 1, etc. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 559 

'The ship of Alexandria' which conveyed St. Paul to Rome, lands him 
at Puteoli [modern Pozzuoli], follows the ordinary course of the Alexan- 
drian corn-ships, as mentioned by Strabo, 6 Philo, 7 and Seneca; 8 and 
touches at the customary harbors. 9 Paul's journey from Troas by Neapolis 
to Philippi, presents an exact parallel to that of Ignatius sixty years 
later. 10 His passage through Amphipolis and Apollonia on the road 
from Philippi to Thessalonica [modern Salonica], is in accordance with 
the Itinerary of Antonine, 11 which places those towns on the route be- 
tween the two cities. 

e) " The mention of Philippi as ' the first city of Macedodia ' 12 to one 
approaching from the east, is entirely correct, since there was no other 
between it and Neapolis. The statement that it was ' a colony' is also 
true." 13 

§ 395. The Cities of Asia. 

a) Damascus (Syria). 

1 'Neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before 
me ; but I went away into Arabia ; and again I returned unto Da- 
mascus." 14 " In Damascus the governor under Aretas the king guarded 
the city of the Damascenes in order to take me ; and through a window 
I was let down in a basket by the wall, and escaped his hands." 15 

This Aretas was king of Arabia, whose capital was Petra. 
Herod Antipas married his daughter; then repudiated her, 
and married Herodias, the wife of Herod Philip [I] while her 
husband was still living, for which John Baptist sternly re- 
proved Antipas, while Aretas made war upon him and de- 
stroyed Herod's army. Thereupon Herod appealed to Emperor 
Tiberius for counsel and help ; and Tiberius ordered Yitellius, 
then president of Syria, to capture Aretas dead or alive, and 
send him to Rome in chains, or send him his head. 16 But before 
this order could be executed, Tiberus died, on March 12th, 
A. D. 37, and the news of his death reached Yitellius at Jerusa- 
lem while on the march with his army to take Aretas. Yitel- 
lius now regarded the order as nugatory, and its requirement 
as extinguished; whereupon he returned to Antioch in Syria. 
Yitellius is said to have entertained an old grudge against 

*Ant. xviii, 6, 3. » i n Mace. 968, 969. *Epis.71. [» Suetonius, Titus, c. 5. 
io Martyr. Ignat. c. 5. n lb. c. 2. 12 Acts xvi, 12. 

13 Dion Cassius, Hist, of Rome, 11, 4; Pliny's H. N. iv, 11; Strabo, vii, 41. 

14 Gal. i, 17. 15 See Alford's Comm. on 2 Cor. xi, 32,33; comp. Acts ix, 22-25. 
i 6 Josephus, Ant. xviii, 5, 1-3. 



560 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Herod Antipas. 17 Upon the death of Tiberius, Caius Caligula 
immediately succeeded to the imperial throne at Rome. 

Some considerable embarrassment has been experienced by 
some writers in placing this King Aretas in power over Da- 
mascus just at the time that Paul effected his escape from the 
governor of the city ; and others have not hesitated to pro- 
nounce the statement of Paul as unhistorical. But absolute 
proof to the contrary exists in coins struck by this king; 18 and 
what renders the case the more extraordinary is the fact that 
after the accession of Nero and several of his successors, coins 
again exist. Now Damascus had previously belonged to a pre- 
decessor of this Aretas ; and there is strong probability that 
when Caligula deposed and banished Herod Antipas, giving 
his realm to Herod Agrippa, he also gave Damascus to Aretas. 
Caligula made a number of changes in the year 38, "granting 
Ituraea to Sooemus, Less Armenia, and parts of Arabia, the 
territory of Cotys to Rhsemetalces, 19 etc. Conybeare and 
Howson state that 

" The Nabathsean Arabs, after the Babylonian captivity, grew into a 
civilized nation, built a great mercantile city at Petra, and were ruled by 
a line of kings which bore the title of * Aretas. 7 The Aretas dynasty ceased 
in the second century, when Arabia Petrsea became a Roman province under 
Trajan." 20 

Josephus mentions that the Damascenes had many years 

before invited an earlier Aretas to rule over them ; that Agrippa 

I, the favorite at court, became interested in their behalf ; that 

indeed he received a bribe from them to advocate their claims 

before Flaccus, prefect of Syria. 21 Eckhel then remarks : 

"It is therefore not unlikely that, in A. D. 38, the Damascenes, 
through the influence of Agrippa at the imperial court, may, at his own 
request, have been transferred from the province of Syria to the king- 
dom of Petra. The coins of Aretas (II) , with the inscription ' Lover-of- 

H Josephus, Ant. xviii, 4, 5. 

i 8 See Lewln's Paul, i, 67, 68; comp. Conybeare and Howson's Paul, i, 99, n. 4; 
McOlintock and Strong's Cycl. i, 385, in which is one coin of Nero exactly answer- 
ing to this date, A. D. 37; Smith's Bible Diet, i, 152. 

19 Smith's Bible Diet, i, 152. 20 Life and Epis. of Paul, i, 99, n. 4. 

21 Ant. xviii, 6, 3. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 561 

Greeks,' with whom he wished to ingratiate himself, may have been 
struck on this occasion. It is not a little remarkable that coins of Da- 
mascus have been found with the heads of Augustus and Tiberius ; 22 
but none with the head of Caligula or Claudius ; 23 but in the time of 
Nero 24 the head of the emperor again appears. The inference is that 
Damascus during the reign of Augustus and Tiberius was annexed to 
Syria, but that in the time of Caligula it was severed from it until the 
reign of Nero. This would satisfactorily explain how Damascus came to 
have an ethnarch or Jewish ruler under Aretas in A. D. 39." 25 

" Weiseler, in his article on Aretas, refers to Mionnet as his authority 
for the existence of a coin of Aretas which bears the date of 101 [A. D.] 
Now, if this date refers to the Pompeian era, the coin would belong to 
A. D. 37-38, about the time in which Saul's mission to Damascus took 
place." 26 

Here is evidence drawn from biographical, historical, and 
numismatic sources, all of which concur in confirming the state- 
ments of Paul and Luke respecting Aretas being in power as 
King of Damascus, whose subordinate — a Jewish governor — 
sought to seize upon the person of the apostle when he escaped 
by a basket let down over the wall. Now over against this 
evidence there is absolutely no historical warrant whatever to 
render a contrary conclusion reasonable. Apart from the con- 
firmation, the statement of Paul and Luke are entitled to the 
consideration given to profane writers of history under similar 
circumstances ; and he who challenges is bound to refute the 
sacred writers by historical facts, and not make merest asser- 
tions or assumptions. 

/3) Ephesus (Asia Minor). 

"And when the town clerk [temple-keeper 1 had quieted the multi- 
tude, he saith: Ye men of Ephesus, what man is there who knoweth not 
how that the city of the Ephesians is temple-keeper of the great Diana, 
and of the image which fell down from Jupiter ?" v 

The citizens of Ephesus, in whose keeping the temple was, 

charged the Neokoros with the duty of adorning this sanctuary 

of Diana, especially on the occasions of the public games. 

This temple was known as one of the Seven Wonders of the 

22 A. D. 1-37. 23 a. D. 37-54. 24 a. D. 54-68. 26 Eckhel, iii, 331. 

2 «Farrar's Life and Work of Paul, Vol I; Excursus, viii and ix. 
«Actsxix, 35. 



562 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

World, and the sacred games observed at Ephesus were espe- 
cially famous. There are several coins extant which bear the 
veritable words used by Luke in reference to this particular 
occasion. Some of these coins add "Diana." The term Ne- 
okoros, variously rendered in English,* occurs in the New 
Testament but once, and this one use serves to illustrate the 
minute accuracy of the sacred historian, even in this incidental 
matter, in giving this officer his proper designation. 

Alford says : " He was the keeper of the archives, and public reader 
of the decrees in the assemblies." 28 Thomas Lewin says: " He was in 
fact, during the year he was in office, the representative of the civil 
power, and was president and speaker of the Senate and Assembly. 
This will account for the tone of authority which was assumed by him 
on the riot of Demetrius." 29 Conybeare and Howson say: " The games 
of Asia and Ephesus were pre-eminently famous ; and those who held 
the office of president of the games were men of high distinction and 
extensive influence. When robed in mantles of purple and crowned 
with garlands, they assumed the duty of regulating the gymnastic con- 
tests, and controlling the tumultuary crowd in the theater, they might 
literally be called the ' Chief of Asia.' " 30 
§ 396. The Cities of Europe. 

a) Phtlippi (Macedonia). 

"And on the Sabbath day we went forth without the gate by the 
river-side, where we supposed there was a place of prayer ; and we sat 
down and spake unto the women who had come together." 31 

The question to be asked and answered in reference to the 
Scripture cited is : What is the meaning of Paul's going forth 
oat of the city of Philippi on the Sabbath-day to a place of 
prayer, in order to find a congregation of hearers? The an- 
cient Jews entertained the sentiment that the seashore or 
river-side was the purest possible place of an open country for 
the worship of the pure and true God. The answer to the 
question is best furnished by Jewish and other authorities. 

*New«:6po5-is rendered "Recorder" by Lewin; " Clean- sweeper " by Green, 
but denied by Suidas; " adorner" by Alford and Biscoe; " temple-keeper " by Rev. 
Version; while Thayer's Greek-English Lex. of the New Testament defines the 
term: " 1. A temple-cleaner; 2. One in charge of, and adorner of the temple; 3. A wor- 
shiper of a deity." 

28 In loco. 29 Life and Epis. of Paul, i, 315, 316. 

so Life and Epis. of Paul, ii, 96. a^Acts xvi, 13. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 563 

Josephus says: "Moses . . . thought himself obliged 
to follow the custom of his forefathers, and offered his prayers 
in the open air." ffl He mentions his own friends at Tiberias, 
who "on the next day all came into the proseucha [i. e., place 
of prayer] ; it was a large edifice, and capable of receiving a 
great number of people." 33 He also cites the decree of the 
city Halicarnassus : 

" We have decreed that as many men and women of the Jews as are 
willing so to do, may celebrate their Sabbaths, and perform their holy 
offices, according to the Jewish laws ; and may make their proseuchse at 
the seaside, according to the custom of their forefathers. 5 ' 34 

Philo, the celebrated contemporary of Josephus, mentions 
a custom of the Alexandrian Jews in Egypt, who 

"Early in the morning go out of the gates of the city in crowds; 
that they go to the shores near by, and, standing in a very pure place, 
they raise their voices together 35 [in worship]." " But there are many 
places of prayer, according to each section of the city." 36 

Juvenal refers to the Jews at Eome having a place outside 
the gate Capena, where a fountain was, and plenty of water. 
This was a convenience, for the Jews were accustomed to 
wash their hands before prayers. Tertullian, the Carthagin- 
ian, says: 

" By resorting to these customs you deliberately deviate from your 
religious rites to those of strangers. For the Jewish feasts are the Sab- 
bath, . . . and the fasts of unleavened bread, and prayers at the sea- 
side." 37 And after the temple was burned, and people dispersed, "by 
every seaside " M or river-side. 

Proseucha means prayer; and then by usage acquired the 
secondary sense of a place for prayer. Where no synagogues 
existed it became the place for assemblies, whether it was a 
building, an oratory, a chape], or neither, but out under the 
open sky. Proseuchae were usually placed outside of towns or 

32 Josephus contra, Ap. 1, lib. ii, 2. ^ Life of Josephus, 54. 

34 Ant. xiv, 10, 23. > ^In Flaec. 983, D. 

36 T<2j> irpcxrevx&v iroKkal bk elffl Kad' '£kol<ttov Tfxrjfxa Trj$- iroXewg-, in Flace. 1011. 

3* Orationes littorales; Ad Nationes, 1, xlii. 

38 Per omne litus {Ante-Nic. Fathers, Vol. Ill, p. 123, n. 7, citing de Jejun xvi. 



564 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

cities, as the laws and administrators would not allow them to 
be placed within the walls, especially in the Roman cities and 
colonies. Often they were located in the open air, or in a 
grove, or amidst shrubbery, or under a tree ; yet always near 
the water, for the purpose of ablutions, which preceded Jewish 
devotions, as with the Moslem of to-day. The proseucha 
seems to have existed prior to the synagogue. In Alexandria 
the proseucha was a synagogue, but not so in Judaea. Philippi 
was a colony. No great number of Jews lived there ; and the 
persecution of Paul and Silas at Philippi was due to the Gen- 
tiles and not to the Jews ; for the city was a military garrison, 
a colony of soldiers, and was poorly adapted to trade. The 
proseucha was outside the city, for the reason that the author- 
ities would not permit a service so at variance to heathen wor- 
ship, to be near heathen temples. Thomas Lewin says : 

"These proseuchse were commonly in the open air and uncovered, 
being spacious areas, like for a or market-places. The Jewish ceremo- 
nial law was accompanied with frequent ablutions ; and the public wor- 
ship was generally conducted for convenience in the immediate vicinity 
of water ; and Luke places the oratory in question without the city by 
the side of the river. ... It would seem that this river was not im- 
mediately under the walls of the city, but at some little distance. Now, 
Philippi is surrounded by numerous little springs ; whence its old name 
' Krenides;' 39 but there is only one river 40 in the vicinity, . . . the 
Ganges or Gangites, and is now known as Bournabachi. ... As Paul's 
invariable practice was to make the first appeal to his own countrymen, 
the missionaries on the Sabbath-day attended divine services at the or- 
dinary [proseucha], for the purpose of preaching the new doctrine." 41 

Thus again the custom of Paul in his missionary itinerary 
as recorded by Luke, and incidentally introduced in the narra- 
tion, finds ample confirmation in both ancient and modern 
authorities respecting the Jewish usage of worship of that pe- 
riod in heathen lands. No author of equal antiquity, feigning 
historical claims, would think to adventure into such minute 
particularizations of description for fear of tripping. It is 
precisely this incidental mention of minute details, uncon- 

39 KprjvWe?. w UoTafid?. « Life and Epis. of St. Paul, i, 212, 213. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 565 

sciously inserted, found to be in accordance with other histor- 
ical statements, which carries the conviction that the writer 
was writing the truth on the spot, and relates circumstances 
understanding^ as he saw them. And the conviction is irre- 
sistible. The historian, writing under such circumstances, 
enables the reader to see the facts mentioned through the 
eyes of the writer. 

/3) Thessalonica (Macedonia). • 

"And when they found them not [Paul and Silas], they dragged 
Jason and certain brethren before the rulers of the city, crying : These 
who have turned the world upside down are come hither also ; whom 
Jason hath received ; and these all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar, 
saying there is another king called Jesus. And they troubled the 
multitude and the rulers of the city, when they heard these things." 42 

The term used by Luke for "the rulers" is "the politarchs."® 
It occurs twice in this one citation, but nowhere else in the New 
Testament. The Evangelist employs the word with remarka- 
ble intelligence and discrimination. Etymologically, the title 
means the "rulers or prefects of a city." That which lends in- 
terest to its use here is, that the term which Luke uses with his 
characteristic accuracy is found in no other ancient writing. On 
this account, some have doubted whether the sacred writer was 
correct in employing that particular word to convey the func- 
tion of the city magistrates of Thessalonica. " But wisdom is 
justified of her children." Across the great Roman road known 
as the Egnatian Way, which divides the city in two parts, a 
Triumphal Arch has recently been discovered which was dedi- 
cated to the victory won by Augustus and Antony over Brutus 
and Cassius at Philippi. This highway runs east and west 
through Thessalonica, and this monument stands near the west 
end. Its inscription is in Greek letters written on marble, and 
states that the magistracy of Thessalonica was vested in seven 
men called Politarchs. Professor Salmon says : 

"At Thessalonica the magistrates [in the plural] are called Poli- 
tarchs. Now this name is found in connection with Thessalonica in no 



*2 Acts xvii, 6-8. *3Toi>§- TroXtTapxaS". 



566 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



ancient author ; but the arch which to this day spans the main street 
bears the inscription that it had been raised by the seven politarchs."* 

It is something to be remarked that, out of the seven 
names mentioned in the inscription on the arch as politarchs, 
six are named in the New Testament as Christians, and at 
least three were PauVs personal friends belonging to this par- 
ticular country. These names are Secundus of Thessalonica, 44 
Sopater of Berea, 43 and Gams of Macedonia. 46 

It is the judicious remark of Thomas Lewin: 

11 We have here again an instance of the extreme accuracy of Luke 
in describing the magistrates of Thessalonica by a title not given to them 
in books, from which an impostor might have gathered the fact, but 
found only in ancient monuments accidentally brought to light in com- 
paratively modern times." 47 

Conybeare and Howson remark : 

"It is at least well worth while to notice, as a mere matter of 
Christian evidence, how accurately St. Luke writes concerning the 
political characteristics of the cities and provinces which he mentions. 
He takes notice in the most artless and incidental manner of minute 
details which a fraudulent composer would judiciously avoid, and which, 
in the mythical result of a mere oral tradition, would surely be loose 
and inexact. Cyprus is a proconsular province. 48 Philippi is ' a colony.' 
The magistrates of Thessalonica have an unusual title unmentioned in 
ancient literature ; but it appears, from a monument of a different kind, 
that the title is perfectly correct. And the whole aspect of what hap- 
pened at Thessalonica, as compared with events at Philippi, is in perfect 
harmony with the ascertained difference in the political condition of the 
two places. There is no mention of the rights and privileges of the 
Roman citizen ; but we are presented with a mixed mob of Greeks and 
Jews who are anxious to show themselves to be ' Caesar's friends.'" 49 
"And these magistrates, by whom the question at issue is ultimately 
decided, are not Eoman prsetors, but Greek politarchs." 50 



*Bampton Lects. 1881, 5th ed. p. 322. This arch consists of marble masonry In 
blocks six feet thick, making a span of twelve feet and eighteen feet high. The 
inscription reads: IiOAEITAPXOTNTflN 2122IIIATP0T TOT KAEO IIATPA2 
KAI A0TKI0T II0NTI0T 2EK0TNA0T II0TBAI0T ^AAOTIOT SABEIN0T 
AHMHTPIOT TOT 4>AT2T0T AHMHTPIOT TOT NIKOnOAEfiS ZfllAOT TOT 
IIAPMENmNOS TOT KAI MENISKOT TAIOT AriAAHIOT ITOTEITOT. 
(See Conybeare and Howson'sjPawZ, vol. i, p. 395. 

44 Acts xx, 4. 45J&. xx, 4. 4676. xix, 29. 

viAfe and Epis. of Paul, i, 232, n. 118, and p. 226. 48 Acts xiii, 7. 

«Comp. John xix, 12. soLife and Epis. of Paul, i, 396. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 567 

This minute exactness with which the Evangelist Luke — 
traveling through strange countries where different languages 
are spoken and different customs of the people prevail under 
different governments, making mention of different communi- 
ties in different lands and different officers in different cities and 
nations, recording titles not to be found in books, yet since 
proved conclusively to be correct — is something wonderful as 
an attestation of the writer's superior intelligence and relia- 
bility. Some of these terms and designations have been ques- 
tioned or denied as being true; others were unknown to his- 
tory, and therefore doubted; but every one, once questioned, 
has since been strictly verified as historical. Thus a "pro- 
consul" presided at Cyprus; a "chiliarch" 51 commanded sol- 
diers at Jerusalem; the "asiarchs" 52 ruled at Ephesus; the 
"praetors" and "lictors" are found in Koman Philippi; 53 and 
"politarchs" 54 are in authority in Greek Thessalonica. 

7) Athens (Achaia). 

"Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was pro- 
voked within him as he beheld the city full of idols. And Paul said : 
Ye men of Athens, in all things I perceive that ye are very religious* 
For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found 
an altar with this inscription: To the Unknown God." 66 

The special point to be determined is, whether an altar 
bearing such inscription as is here affirmed was existent as an 
altar of devotion in Athens at the time mentioned. Some 
opinions have doubted the historical worth of Paul's state- 
ment and Luke's record. What proof, if any, does history 
furnish in conformity with the apostle's observation, inci- 
dentally mentioned by him in his address on the hill Areop- 
agus, in this classic city? 

First. It is to be carefully observed that the Greeks were 
conspicuous as being an extremely religious people, and the 

* AeicridaifiovecrT^povg- . 

51 XiXiapxo?, commander of a thousand, Acts xxi, 31. 

s*A<ridpx , nr, the officer of provincial "Asia," in charge of festivals and games. 
Acts xix, 31. 53 id. xvi, 35. ^Id. xvii, 6, 8. ™ld. xvii, 16, 22, 23. 



568 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Athenians were the most devoted of the Greeks. Josephus, 
the contemporary of Paul, explicitly affirms that the Athenians 
were "the most religious of the Greeks." 56 Now, at this 
period, the Romans pursued the policy of suppressing Judaism 
and Christianity as one, because the object of worship was not 
authorized by the State ; but, upon the contrary, the Athenians, 
being of more liberal sentiment, received by public authority* 
the deities of foreign nations, and even erected altars to those 
who were to them unknown. Jerome 57 mentions that at 
Athens an altar was dedicated to the gods of Europe, Asia, 
and Africa ; that is, the gods of the world at large were com- 
prehensively included, whether known or unknown. To the 
testimony of Jerome is to be added that of the geographer 
Strabo, who says that "the Athenians, as they were accus- 
tomed to take other things from foreigners, so also the gods ; 
for from strangers they received many rites, even to such an 
extent as to be made the subject of comedy." 58 Pausanias, 59 
an antiquarian traveler who visited Athens from fifty to a 
hundred years after the apostle, makes mention of temples 
erected to the gods, extending along the highway for five 
miles from the harbor Pera?us to the Acropolis of the city, and 
he remarks that, while all Greece was notable for devotion to 
religion, more gods existed in Athens than in all the remain- 
ing country. G. S. Davies, A. M., in his work entitled Paul in 
Greece, says: 

" We learn from Pliny that, at the time of Nero, Athens contained 
over three thousand statues, besides a countless number of less 
images within the walls of private houses. If there were the least 
reason to suspect Pliny of exaggeration, Pausanias's subsequent descrip- 
tion would assist us to realize its veracity. In one street, well known 
to the readers of history for its connection with one of the strangest 
episodes in Athenian politics, there stood before every house a square 
pillar carrying upon it a bust of the god Hermes, whence the street bore 

*It was death for any private person to disturb the religion of the State by 
the introduction of a foreign god that had not been recognized. (Lewin, Life and 
Epis. of Paul, i, 260.) 

56Toi5f eixrepto-TaTovc twv 'EWtivuv, Contra Ap. ii, 12. 5? Coram. Tit. i, 12. 

58 Lib. x, 471. wPausan. xxiv, c. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile Would. 569 

the name of ' the street Hermes.' Another street of the Tripods was 
lined with tripods dedicated by winners in Greek national games, and 
carrying each one an inscription of a deity." 60 

In short, so numerous were the niches for the statues of 
the gods in this classic and elegant city, that in every grove 
and garden, on every street and avenue, at every gate and angle 
of the highway, at every porch and purlieu, was a sculptured 
form of a deity to address the eye, or a sanctuary for devo- 
tions to a god. Everywhere was one in the presence of a 
divinity ; so that the stricture of a Roman satirist was hardly 
an exaggeration, that " in Athens it was easier to find a god 
than a man." 61 Even the Acropolis, the eminence of great 
height, which was the earliest seat of Athens, whose summit 
embraces about two acres, was adorned with marble tem- 
ples of a magnificent order and finish — the crowning glory of 
Athens — parts of which temples remain to this day, evi- 
dencing the greatest skill of the mightiest masters of art, 
verifying the figurative saying attributed to Xenophon that 
" The Acropolis was one altar, sacrifice, and votive offering to 
the gods, and that they were obliged to keep such a number of 
feasts as did no other city of the Greeks." 62 Dionysius Hali- 
carnassensis declares that, " If any praise belonged to the city 
of the Athenians, it was chiefly that in all things, and at all 
times, they followed the gods, and did nothing without their 
direction." 63 These facts are in strict accordance with the 
statement that there did exist at Athens an altar dedicated 
" To the Unknown God." 

Secondly. "We are not left to conjecture, however, as 
to the specific fact of such an altar as that referred to by 
the apostle, which commanded the devotions of the Athenians. 
Apollonius says that, at Athens, altars of the unknown gods 
were built; 64 and other pagan writers mention those dedicated 

60 Pp. 140, 141. n\Petron. Sat. 17; cf. Llvy, xlv, 29. 62 Be Repub. Ath. 699, B. 

« Thucyd. Hist. $4-, med. 

^ k.Qt\vi]<nv oh koI dypucrTojv 5aifwvu)v ^(Vfwl'idpvvvTat, Philos.de Vlt.Apoll. vi,3. 



570 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

to unknown divinities, 65 wherein the use of the plural number 
by no means necessitates the conclusion that there was none 
in the singular as well as in the plural. It is fairly inferable 
that each altar bore the inscription, ' To the Unknown God.' 
Winer so understands the application of these words, and Dr. 
Plumptre seems so to regard this as the intended meaning, 
comparing the celebrated inscription on the veil of Isis and a 
Mithraic inscription on an altar at Ostia, 'The Sign of the 
Undiscovered Deity.' " m 

The Greeks represented their own gods invariably in statu- 
ary, of whose origin, character, and history they had their own 
accounts. Accordingly, it was difficult for them to conceive 
that there could be a Divine Being who was at once "the 
eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God." If, withal, 
they knew not even his name, they must hold in reverential 
regard One whom others cognized as "The Unknown God." 
Such was the Hebrews' God. To pronounce the Ineffable 
Name Jehovah 67 belonged alone to the high priest, which 
he could pronounce only on the great day of Atonement, 
when he stood in the Holy of Holies, sprinkling the mercy- 
seat with blood, to atone for the sins of the people. By 
reason of the Name being incommunicable, the proper pro- 
nunciation of it at length was lost, and became "unknown." 
That the Athenian altar referred directly to the true God, is 
obvious in that the apostle identified him as such when he 
said: "Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I 
unto you." The Greek historian of the Komans, Dion Cassius, 
designates as the Divine Being that which "may not be ex- 
pressed." In reply to Philo and his Jewish companions, Caius 
Caligula replied: "Ye are god-haters who esteem not me to 
be a god, but Him that may not be named by you." 68 Lucan 
and also Trebellius Pollio mention Him as " an undiscovered 



65 ' Ayviho-Tuv daLfAOvwv, Diog. La'ert. i, x, 110, etc. 

«* Farrar's Life and Work of Paul, 1, 531, n. 4. « niiV 

6 8'AXXA rhv aKaropd/Aao-Tov v/mv, Philo, Leg. ad Caium, $44, p. 1041, A. B. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile "World. 571 

[uncertain] God;" 69 and Justin Martyr refers to God as the 
"All-Hidden" 70 in the sense of the invisible, unrevealed. But 
in the second century, Lucian, in his work called Philopatris, 
written in opposition to Christianity, represents a Christian as 
saying: " We have found the Unknown God at Athens, and 
worshiped him with hands outstretched towards heaven ; and 
we give thanks to him as being thought worthy to be the sub- 
jects of his power;" 71 and this writer in another place, em- 
ploys this formula of an oath : " I swear by the Unknown God 
at Athens." 72 

Thirdly. As already intimated, Paul distinctly claims the 
"Unknown God" of the Athenian altar as identical with the 
Hebrew Jehovah, whom the apostle proceeds to make known: 
" Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto 
you." The Jehovah of the Old Testament, is the Jesus of the 
New. The Athenians conceived the existence of the invisible 
God, but confessed ignorance of his character and relation to 
them as his worshipers. This fact at least is secure; but 
how could the idea of such a deity have been imported into 
Athens? 

When Alexander the Great made his extended campaign 
against the Persians, he passed through Palestine (about 
B. C. 333); and as he approached Jerusalem he was met by a 
multitude of the Jews. The mighty conqueror stood in utter 
amazement when he beheld the high priest 73 at the front of 
the people, robed in purple and scarlet cloth, bearing upon a 
golden plate on the forefront of his miter the inscription 
of the incommunicable Name written in four Hebrew let- 
ters, 74 which in reverence none but the high priest could ever 
pronounce, and he only when alone in the Holy of Holies once 



69 " Incertus Deus," Pharsalia, ii, 592. 

70 Trdyi<pv(po?, Paraead Oraec. $38. 

rc'H/ieif 5£ rbv iv 'Adrjvcu? dyvojarov (petipovre? , etc., Philopat. xxix, 180. 

72 N77 top ayvuxTTOP £v ' A9tjpcu? , Philopat. xiii, 769. 

73 That is, the high priest Jaddua ('laddov?) B. C. 332; Josephus, Ant. xi, 8, 3-6. 

li TX\TY— Jehovah^ or probably pronounced "Fa7iye/i." 



572 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

a year. Further, Josephus relates that, upon discovering this 
]\ T ame, Alexander "approached by himself, and adored that 
Name," declaring that at Deos in Macedonia he had had a 
vision, in which he saw this identical man as high priest, in 
these robes, and bearing this miter with this inscrutable 
Name, who urged Alexander to push on his campaign, for he 
would 

" Conquer Darius, and destroy the power of the Persians ;" that he 
then " went up into the temple and offered sacrifice to God, according to 
the high priest's directions, and magnificently treated both the high 
priest, and the [other] priests. And when the Book of Daniel was shown 
him, wherein Daniel declared that one of the Greeks should destroy the 
empire of the Persians, he supposed that himself was the person in- 
tended." Moreover, " he said to the multitude that if any of them 
should enlist in his army, they should continue to live according to the 
laws of their forefathers, . . . and many were ready to accompany 
him in his wars." 75 

Now, since the spread of the Greek language throughout 
the East is attributed to this conqueror and campaign, with so 
many Jews mixed with his soldiery in making his conquests, it 
is rational to suppose that, upon his return to Greece, Alexander 
and his army brought with them a knowledge of the Supreme 
Being whose prophet had predicted Alexander's successes, 
especially as Alexander himself had had a vision apart from 
the prediction of Daniel respecting him, all of which had been 
verified now in history to the very letter. Nevertheless, as 
respected the relation, the character, and claim of this inscru- 
table Deity, he must have remained to the religious Athenians 
essentially "The Unknown God." About a half-century after- 
wards, the Jewish Scriptures were translated into the Greek 
Septuagint, and were published abroad as that language be- 
came the language of common intercourse between the na- 
tions. 76 

Thomas Lewin observes : 

" Since the conquest of Alexander the Great an intimacy subsisted 
between the Jews and Greeks, and in particular the Athenians had en- 



75 Ant. xi, 8, 5; comp. Dan. vii, 6; viii, 3-8, 20-22; xi, 3. n About 280 B. C 




Is 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 573 

tered into a treaty with that singular people, and had greatly honored 
Hyrcanus the high priest ; and it is scarcely credible that the Athenians 
who adopted the gods of all foreigners, should have excluded Jehovah, 
whose mighty acts could not but be familiar to the neighboring nations." 77 

Nor is there any evidence of such exclusion. 

Here is a combination of circumstances extraordinary in- 
deed, and without a parallel in history. The repeated refer- 
ence to the Athenian altar bearing such an inscription — an 
altar with reference to which oaths were solemnized; the 
different forms of expression used by different heathens, espe- 
cially by Roman pagans of eminence ; such as emperor, historian, 
and adversary to Christianity, as well as by Christians, to con- 
vey the thought of "The Unknown" but not unknowable 
God — are the things which justify the belief in the historical 
existence of the Athenian altar and inscription referred to by 
the Apostle Paul, and recorded by Luke. As to the identity 
of that God with the nameless one seen by Alexander in his 
vision at Deos, and afterward on the high priest's miter near 
Jerusalem, known as the incommunicable Name, and Alexan- 
der's return to Greece with his army in close contact with so 
many Jews, these facts furnish a reasonable and sufficient 
ground for the Athenians to erect for themselves an altar with 
the inscription, "To the Unknown God." 78 

§397. Paul's Voyage to Rome (Mediterranean Sea). 

I. 

"And when it was determined that we should sail for Italy, they 
delivered Paul and certain other prisoners to a centurion named Julius, 
of the Augustan band. 79 And embarking on a ship of Adramyttium 
which was about to sail unto the places on the coast of Asia, we put to 

sea." 80 

Whether Julius and his cohort were citizen soldiers of Caesa- 
rea, a city of Judaea, built in honor of Augustus Caesar, or be- 

n Life and Epis. of Paul, i, 263, 264. 

78 See Lewin, Life and Epis. of St. Paul, i, 263, 264. 

w^ireLprj? 'ZePa&TTjg- Augustan cohort, from the city Sebaste; both city and. 
cohort so named in honor of Augustus, the first and honored emperor of the 
Romans. so Acts xxvii, 2. 

37 



574 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

longed to that band at Rome which was attached to the person 
of the emperor, is possibly now indeterminate, and certainly 
is irrelevant to this discussion. There are opinions favoring 
each proposition among learned men. There is conclusive 
proof that in both countries there were bodies of soldiers bear- 
ing the designation. Alford thinks that Julius had been sent 
from Rome to Asia on some service, and was now returning 
when Paul, with other prisoners, was placed in his charge. 
Josephus says that, "the Syrians, . . . valuing themselves 
highly on this account, that the greatest part of the Roman 
soldiers that were there \i. e. at Caesarea] were either of Caes- 
area or Sebaste." a 
Tacitus says: 

"At this time also was first enrolled the body of Roman knights 
entitled Augustani; men in the prime of life and remarkable for their 
bodily vigor. Some were naturally licentious, others with the pros- 
pects of promotion. They are occupied by day and night in applaud- 
ing the prince [the emperor] as loudly as they could, applying to him 
and his voice terms appropriate to the gods, and lived in honor and re- 
nown, as though they were preferred for their virtues. " 82 

II. 

But the main predicates in the Scripture cited may be 
formulated thus : that prisoners were not unf requently sent to 
Rome for judgment ; that often they were sent to the capital 
in chains; that those from this region were sent to Italy by 
sea ; and that the apostle was thus sent upon his appeal unto 
Caesar. 

It is interesting to know in the outset that every impor- 
tant detail of the apostle's voyage, as reported in Acts, has 
been questioned and even condemned in advance of any 
proper investigation. It is even more interesting to know 
that the whole history of Paul's journey thither has been 
traversed critically anew ; and after the most critical exami- 
nation possible, every particular narrated by Luke has been 

81 Josephus mentions that " Cumanus took one troop of horsemen out of 
Caesarea called the troop of Sebaste." Wars, ii, 12, 5. 

82 Annals, xiv, 15; comp. Sueton. on Nero, c. 20, close. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 575 

completely verified. The nautical terms used by Luke have 
been declared incorrect ; the ports mentioned have been un- 
real; the Island of Melita (Malta), the scene of Paul's ship- 
wreck, has been called a myth ; the existence of serpents on 
the island has been absolutely denied ; and the geography and 
hydrography of the route have been more than doubted ; while 
maps and charts have been reconstructed accordant with these 
preconceived notions. 

As intimated, a comparatively recent survey, conducted 
upon strictly scientific principles of modern navigation, has 
been made, which not only destroys these false assumptions, 
but substantiates beyond recall the record by Luke of Paul's 
voyage. A thorough search has been made into the local and 
historical facts, independently of traditions, relating to the har- 
bors touched in the route, and verifications found and recorded, 
which leaves nothing more to be desired. The results have 
been given to the world, published in London, entitled The 
Voyage and Shipwreck of St. Paul® in which both processes 
and conclusions are given. One or two citations must suffice : 

" Since the second edition was printed, the completion of the 
Admiralty survey of the South Coast of Crete, and the publication of 
sailing directions for the Island of Crete by Captain Spratt, R. N., and 
the travels and researches in Crete by the same author, leave noth- 
ing to be desired for the geographical details of this part of the voyage. 
We have now all four localities mentioned; viz., Fair Havens, Clauda, 
Lasea, and Port Phenice, each of them agreeing most minutely with the nar- 
ratives, and still retaining the names given them by St. Luke." 84 

' ' Although we can scarcely have a stronger case of traditional evi- 
dence than the present, in the following inquiry I attach no weight to it 
whatever. I do not even assume the authenticity of the narrative of 
the voyage and shipwreck contained in Acts of the Apostles, but scru- 
tinize St. Luke's account of the voyage, precisely as I would do those 
of Baffin or Middleton, or of any ancient voyage of doubtful authority, 
or involving points on which controversies have been raised. A search- 
ing comparison of the narrative with the localities where the events so 
circumstantially related are said to have taken place, with the aids 
which recent advances in our knowledge of the geography and the navi- 
gation of the eastern part of the Mediterranean supply, accounts for 

83 By James Smith, F. R. S., etc., 3d ed. 1866. 

84 " Voyage and Shipwreck,'" Preface, 3d ed, p. 1. 



576 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

every transaction, clears up every difficulty, and exhibits an agreement so 
perfect in all its parts as to admit of but one explanation, namely, that it is 

A NARRATION OF REAL EVENTS, WRITTEN BY ONE PERSONALLY ENGAGED IN 
THEM, AND THAT THE TRADITION RESPECTING- THE LOCALITY IS TRUE." M 

It is a common practice of the period for the authorities to 

send prisoners from this region to Rome, to account to the 

emperor for their conduct. Josephus says that Quadratus, 

president of Syria, 

" Sent away Ananus the high priest, and Ananas the commander 
[of the Temple], in bonds to Rome, to give an account of what they 
had done to Claudius Caesar. He also ordered the principal men, both 
of the Samaritans and of the Jews, as also Cumanus the procurator, 
and Celer the tribune, to go to Italy to the emperor that he might hear 
their cause and determine their differences. 5 ' 86 "Then Varus did for- 
give the multitude their offenses, but sent their captain to Caesar to be 
examined by him." 87 " Felix took Eleazar, the arch robber, and many of 
them that were with him alive, when they had ravaged the country for 
twenty years together, and sent them to Rome." 88 " When Felix was 
procurator of Judaea, there were certain priests of my acquaintance, and 
very excellent persons they were, whom, on small and trifling occasions, 
he had put into bonds and sent them to Rome to plead their cause before 
Caesar." 89 " Vitellius sent Marcellus, a friend of his, to take care of the 
affairs of Judaea, and ordered Pilate to go to Rome to answer before the 
emperor the accusation of the Jews." 90 

Pliny remarks of his own administration respecting the 

Christians : 

" There were others under like infatuation ; but as they were Roman 
citizens, I directed them to be sent to the capital." 91 Suetonius states 
that "All appeals in causes between inhabitants of Rome were assigned 
every year to the praetor of the city, and, where the provincials were 
concerned, to men of consular rank, to one of whom the business of 
each province was referred." 92 

§ 398. Shipwreck at Melita (Malta). 

III. 
"And when we were escaped, then we knew that the island was 
called Melita " (Malta). 93 

Several persons of distinction have expressed the opinion 
that the island Malta was not the scene of Paul's shipwreck, 

85 Voyage and Shipwreck, Introd. xv, xvi. 

MAnt. xx, 6, 2; Wars, 11, 12, 6. s; Wars, li, 5, 3. ss lb. 11, 13, 2. 

89 Life Josephus, $ 3. ™A nt. xviii, 4, 2. 

91 Epis. to Trajan; comp. Martyr. Ignatius, c. 11. 92 Augustus, 33. 

»3 Acts xxviil, 1. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 577 

and others have not hesitated to claim the occurrence took 
place at the island Melita, or Meleda, in the Adriatic Sea or 
Gulf of Venice. Thus Lord Lindsay says : " This [Malta] is 
not the Melita where St. Paul was shipwrecked." 94 Neal 
affirms : " I am bound to express my entire certainty that 
Melita is Meleda." % Coleridge adds : " The supposition itself 
is quite absurd." % 

All this, however, proves to be the merest conjecture, and 
is thoroughly refuted by Smith's work reporting the survey 
and research on all questions involved. His reasoning is too 
copious for extraction, and too minute for condensation. His 
conclusions may be sufficiently indicated by brief citations 
from the work. He says : 

" There is one objection to the locality assigned by the Maltese tra- 
dition as the scene of the shipwreck which meets us at the very thresh- 
old of our inquiry, and which it is necessary to obviate in a work 
which aims at exhausting the subject. It is maintained by Giorgi, 
Bryant, Falconer, and others, that it did not take place at Malta at 
all, but at Meleda, in the Gulf of Venice, an island which was anciently 
known by the same name as Malta, namely, Melita. But for the above- 
mentioned reasons I should have been much inclined to have noticed 
this objection very briefly, thinking, with Joseph Scaliger, that it would 
not deserve to be confuted if it had not had supporters. But when I 
find it adopted by modern commentators and biographers, ... I 
feel called upon to subject the arguments by which it is supported to a 
minute and sifting examination." 97 

11 The progress of the narrative has brought us to the question whether 
the traditional locality is in reality that of the shipwreck. Now, if we 
attend minutely to the narrative, it will be seen that the number of con- 
ditions required to be fulfilled, in order to make any locality agree with 
it, are so numerous as to render it morally impossible to suppose that 
the agreement which we find here is the effect of chance." 98 

Conybeare and Howson say: " This therefore is the place for sum- 
ming up the evidence which has been gradually accumulating in proof 
that it was the modern Malta. We have already seen the almost irre- 
sistible inference which follows from the consideration of the direction 
and rate of drift since the vessel was laid-to under the lee of Clauda. 
But we shall find that every succeeding indication not only tends to 
bring to the shore of this island, but to the very bay (the Cala di San 

w Letters, i, 19. ^Notices of Dalmatia. 96 Table Talks, 185. 

9T Introd. to " Voyage," xxx-xxxii. 98 zb. pp. 127, 128. 



578 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Paolo), which has always been the traditional scene of the wreck." 99 
M. Renan says: ''They soon learned that they were on the island of 
Malta." 100 "TheCaladi San Paolo at Malta corresponds well to the 

Acts." 101 

IV. 

" Now in the neighborhood of the place were lands belonging to the 
chief man of the island named Publius, who received us and entertained 
us three days courteously." 102 

"The chief man of the island" 103 may mean the principal 
personage of Maltese society, it may mean distinctively an 
official title, or it may refer to one who possessed both claims. 
It is the natural sense that Luke meant the official title. Two 
inscriptions have been discovered in Malta, one written in 
Greek, the other in Latin, and in both the term is of the same 
import, and is an official title applied to a Roman knight. He 
was called "Primate of the Maltese." 10 * 



"But when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks and laid them on 
the fire, a viper came out by reason of th 3 heat and fastened on his hand. 
And when the barbarians saw the creature hanging on his hand, they said 
one to another: No doubt this man is a murderer, whom though he has 
escaped the sea, yet Justice hath not suffered to live. Howbeit, he shook 
off the creature into the fire and took no harm, . . . [when] they 
said that he was a god." 105 

Coleridge again adventures a conjectural opinion when he 
says: "Now, in our Malta there are, I may say, no snakes at 
all!" 106 

The assertion of the merest speculative conclusion is some- 
thing very different from the assertion of a well-ascertained 
fact. It is an error to say there are no serpents in Malta ; and 
if there were none, it would not prove that there were not any 
in Paul's time. Luke distinctly designates the viper, 107 which 
is a venomous reptile. The following citations were written 

99 Life and Epis. of Paul, ii, 421. 100 Saint Paul, 323. 101 lb. 421, 18. 

iwActs xxviii, 7. 

103 UpCoTO? rr\<; vi\<Jov • comp. Mark vi, 21; Acts, xili, 50; xxviii, 7. 

104 Hpwro? MeXircuW ; and in Latin "Mel. Primus" " Voyage," 150, 151 ; Lewin'3 
Life and Epis. of Paul, ii, 208, 209. 

105 Acts xxviii, 3-6. ioe Table Talk, 185. iw'Extiw, a Viper. 



Pajl's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 579 

by two different parties who visited the island for the purpose 
of critical observations, and will prove very evidential on the 
points questioned. The writers are of the highest authority, 
who traversed the entire region and made thorough investiga- 
tions. Thomas Lewin, Esq., remarks : 

11 It has been objected to this account [of Luke] : 1. That there is no 
wood in Malta, except at Bosquetta; and, 2. That there are no vipers in 
Malta. How then, it is said, could the apostle have collected the sticks, 
and how could a viper have fastened upon his hand ? But when I visited 
the Bay of St. Paul in 1851 by sea, I observed trees growing in the vicin- 
ity, and there were also fig-trees growing amongst the rocks at the 
water's edge where the vessel was wrecked. But there is a better ex- 
planation still. When I was again at Malta in 1853, I went with two 
companions to the Bay of St. Paul by land, and this was the same season 
of the year as when the wreck occurred. We now noticed on the shore 
just opposite the scene of the wreck, eight or nine stacks of small fagots, 
and in the nearest stack I counted twenty-five bundles. They consisted of a 
kind of thorny heather, and had evidently been cut for firewood ; as we 
strolled about, my companions, whom I had quitted to make observa- 
tions, put up a viper, or a reptile having the appearance of one, which 
escaped into the bundles of sticks. It may not have been poisonous, but it 
was like an adder, and was quite different from the common snake. 
One of my fellow-travelers was quite familiar with the difference be- 
tween snakes and adders, and could not well be mistaken. After all, 
therefore, it may be found that vipers, though rare, still exist at 
Malta." 108 

Admiral Smith adds his testimony. He says : 

"My lamented friend, the late Dr. Landsborough, in his interesting 
excursions in Arran has repeatedly noticed the gradual disappearance of 
the viper from that island since it has become more frequented. . . . 
Perhaps there is nowhere a surface of equal extent, in so artificial a 
state as that of Malta is at the present day, and nowhere has the abo- 
riginal forest been more completely cleared ; but it by no means follows 
that this was the case when St. Luke wrote. Indeed, there are tra- 
ditions and other indications of former woods in the island. We need 
not, therefore, be surprised that, with the disappearance of the woods, 
the noxious reptiles which infested them should also disappear. " 109 

It is obvious from these facts that there are, even in this 
day, serpents in Malta, which is the special thing denied ; that 
there are yet fagots of wood gathered in bundles for burning 

™Life and Epis. of Paul, ii, 208. ™ 9 Voyage and Shipwreck, 148, 149. 



580 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

on the very shores of the shipwreck, as in Paul's time ; that a 
serpent bearing the characteristic marks of the viper, and un- 
like any other snake, took refuge in a bundle of firewood, 
exactly as related in Luke's narrative. These facts can not be 
ignored. Nevertheless, the burden of proof is with the 
objector by the established rules of logic. It is his part to 
prove by veritable facts, and not assume or assert without 
proof, that there are not now, and never were, wood and 
vipers in Malta, the shipwreck can be shown to be unhis- 
torical. The facts which remain to be refuted are those 
cited by these persons who purposely visited the island to 
make critical investigations on the spot, and whose high au- 
thority can not be set aside by the merest conjectural asser- 
tions, without facts, by those who have never made a personal 
examination of the island, and have no justifying reasons for 
their disbelief. 

§ 399. The Harbor Puteoli (the modern Pozzuoli). 

"After three months we set sail in a ship of Alexandria which had 
wintered in the island, whose sign was The Twin Brothers. And touch- 
ing at Syracuse, we tarried there three days. And from thence we 
made a circuit and arrived at Ehegium ; and after one day a south wind 
sprang up, and on the second day we came to Puteoli ; . and so 

we came to Eome." 110 

The ancient harbor of Italy on the Mediterranean where the 
vessels from Alexandria landed was called by the Italians 
Puteoli, but the older name given it by the Eomans was Di- 
cearchia. It is now called Pozzuoli. Sir James Smith describes 
this port thus : 

" Puteoli was then, as it is now, the most sheltered part of the Bay 
of Naples. It was the principal port of Southern Italy, and in particular 
it was the great emporium for the Alexandrian wheat-ships. Seneca, in 
one of his epistles, gives an interesting and graphic account of the 
arrival of the Alexandrian fleet. All ships entering the bay were 
obliged to strike the topsails except wheat-ships, which were allowed to 
carry theirs. They could therefore be distinguished whenever they 
hove in sight. It was the practice to send forward fast-sailing vessels 
to announce the speedy arrival of a fleet." m 

noActs xxviii, 11-14. 1U Voyage, etc., 153, 154. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 581 

Suetonius mentions that after the subjugation of the Jews 
in Judaea, Titus resolved to go to Eome; "therefore, making 
what haste he could into Italy, he arrived at Puteoli, [and] 
went to Rome with all possible expedition." m The late Pro- 
fessor Kenan, of Paris, said: "Puteoli, as we have already 
said, was that port of Italy most frequented by the Jews. It 
was there in general that ships from Alexandria discharged 
their cargoes." 113 Josephus, describing his own shipwreck 
when journeying to Rome says that at length, he came " to 
Dicearchia, which the Italians call Puteoli ;" 114 that by sail, on 
a certain occasion, Herod " Agrippa [I] was come to Puteoli ;" 115 
and that Herod Antipas and the slave Fortunatus "both sailed 
to Dicearchia" m in search of the emperor. Thus the two 
names given the harbor near Naples were used interchange- 
ably, and it is the same harbor where Paul and his ship's 
company landed, and he was met by Jewish brethren, and 
thence pursued his course over the Appian Way through " the 
Market of Appius" and "the Three Taverns" to Rome. The 
custom of sending forward "fast-sailing vessels" to discover 
and announce the approach of the grain-ships from Alexan- 
dria, accounts for the fact that the brethren resident at Pute- 
oli, and even at Rome, had opportunity to meet the apostle — 
the one class at the harbor, and the other at the Three 
Taverns, which was forty-three miles south of the Capital. 
The entire distance from Puteoli to Rome was about one hun- 
dred and forty-one miles; a distance which Paul and Luke 
traveled afoot. 

8 400. Paul at Rome (Italy). 

V. 

"And when we had entered into Rome, the centurion delivered the 
prisoners to the captain of the Praetorian guard ; but Paul was suffered 
to abide by himself with the soldier that guarded him." 117 

IJlpian is referred to as authority for the statement that 
it was the part of the chief ruler of the country under the Ro- 
ns Titus, v. H3 St. Paul, 324. m Life of Josephus, $3. 
™Ant. xviii, 8, 3, 4. » B Z6. xviii, 7. 2. "^Acts xxviii, 16. 



582 Historical Evidence of the ISTew Testament. 

mans, to determine whether an arrested person should be 
immured in prison, or should be committed to the keeping of 
a soldier, or should be placed in charge of securities, or be left 
to take care of himself." 118 It is evident, then, that the 
prisoners of the Romans in military custody could be treated 
with severity or lenity, at the discretion of the chief officer 
of the law, he taking into account the previous character and 
standing of the prisoner in society. Tacitus makes note of an 
instance in point, in the treatment of a Roman lady by the 
Emperor Tiberius, who "took the slaves of [Emilia] Lapida 
from the guard of the soldiers, and transferred them to the 
consuls ; nor did he suffer them to be examined by torture." 119 

When Herod Agrippa (I) was young, pursuing his educa- 
tion at Rome, for words of indiscretion spoken to his friend 
young Caligula disrespectful of the Emperor Tiberius, Agrippa 
was imprisoned for six months. Through the influence of 
Antonia, Caligula's grandmother, it was permitted " his freed- 
men and friends to come to him, and that other things that 
tended to ease him might be indulged him." w 

The case of the apostle throughout his period of imprison- 
ment from Jerusalem to Rome illustrates in a remarkable 
manner, no less the dignity and commanding character of the 
prisoner than the consideration, and even sympathy, extended 
to him as a Roman citizen who was not charged with any 
crime. It was purely a question of religion between Paul and 
the Jews, and his being conducted in bonds to Rome was on 
his own "appeal to Caesar" in order to avoid being judged by 
those who had already formed a conspiracy against his life. 
Claudius Lysias, the commandant of the castle Antonia at 
Jerusalem, not only showed him much courtesy, but in his 
official letter to the procurator at Caesarea, he expressly states 
that the prisoner was merely "accused of questions of their 
[the Jews'] law, but to have nothing laid to his charge worthy 



us Digest of Justinian, xlviii, Tituli 3; De Ulp. i; comp. Acts xxiv, 28. 
us Annals, iii, 22. wjosephus, Ant. xviii, 6, 6, 7. 



Paul's Missionary Journeys to the Gentile World. 583 

of death or of bonds." m Even the conscienceless Felix at 
Caesarea ordered that " he should be kept in charge, and should 
have indulgence, and not to forbid any of his friends to min- 
ister unto him." m His successor, Festus, after having made 
an occasion of much magnificence, presented Paul to King 
Herod Agrippa II, before whom the apostle made his pow- 
erful defense. "Then said Agrippa unto Festus, This man 
might have been set at liberty, if he had not appealed unto 
CaBsar." 123 

When started upon the voyage to Rome, at Sidon the officer 
in charge, " Julius, treated Paul kindly, and gave him leave to 
go unto his friends and refresh himself." m At Malta, the scene 
of the shipwreck, Luke narrates how " the barbarians showed 
us no common kindness ; for they kindled a fire and received 
us all, because of the present rain and because of the cold." 125 
And " the chief man of the island, named Publius," " received 
us and entertained us courteously ; " and the people who had 
been miraculously cured by Paul, "also honored us with many 
honors ; and when we sailed, they put on board such things as 
we needed." 126 Accordingly, ^vhen we recall the leniency of 
the Romans toward the apostle hitherto, we are prepared to un- 
derstand that, when Paul entered the capital, "he was suffered 
to abide by himself with a soldier," "in his own hired dwelling, 
and received all who came unto him, none forbidding him " m 
his labors in the gospel. These facts reflect light upon the 
apostle's own expressions in writing to brethren elsewhere 
during the continuance of his present imprisonment at Rome : 

" So that my bonds became manifest throughout the whole praetorian 
guard, and to all the rest; and that most of the brethren in the Lord, 
being confident through my bonds, are more abundantly bold to speak 
the word of God without fear." 128 "All the saints salute you, especially 
they that are of Caesar's household." 129 



121 Acts xxi, 39, 40; xxiii, 26-30. i 22 76. xxiv, 23. 

123 lb. xxv, 23-27 ; xxvi, 32. 124 lb. xxvii, 3. 

125 lb. xxviii, 2. 126 lb. xxviii, 7-10. 

"7 lb. xxviii, 16, 30, 31 128 Phil, i, 13, 14. 
129 lb. iv, 22. 



584 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

VI. 

If the traditions are historical respecting the last days of 
the Apostle Paul, he wrote his Second Epistle to Timothy by 
a lighted taper when immured in the Mamertine prison, which 
is near the Senate-house, on the Capitoline Hill of Home. It 
was written after his second trial, in which he was condemned 
to die. From the first indictment, which was preferred by 
vicious Jews of Jerusalem, he was exonerated on trial. In 
reference to this occasion Paul himself wrote : 

"Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil; the Lord render 
to him according to his works ; of whom be thou ware also, for he 
greatly withstood our words. At my first defense, no one took my part, 
but all forsook me ; may it not be laid to their account. But the Lord 
stood by me and gave me power, that through me the message might be 
fully proclaimed, and that all the Gentiles might hear. And I was delivered 
out of the mouth of the lion." 130 

It has been the constant tradition that upon his second 
trial, instigated by persons from Ephesus, Paul was condemned 
to die, at some date between 66-68 A. D. This was under the 
reign of Nero. It is said that he was led out through the 
southern gate, which now bears his name, into the Via 
Ostiensis, about two miles, to the " Three Fountains," where 
is a natural amphitheater for the accommodation of the vulgar 
populace, who thronged the Christian prisoner along the way 
to witness his execution. A small church edifice, built in 
1599, is said to mark the spot where the Apostle Paul was 
beheaded. It is called S. Paolo alle Tre Fontaine. 



130 2 Tim. iv, 14-17; comp. 1 Cor, xv, 32; Ignatius, Epis. ad Bom. c. v; and 
Josephus, Ant. xviii, 6, 10. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

VEKIFICATIOlSr OF THE NEW TESTAMENT 
AS HISTOKICAL. 
I. Consideration of Some Points Preliminary to the Investigation. 

1. The First Three Centuries of the Christian Era the Old 

Battleground. 

2. Paul's First Four Epistles Concededly Authentic and 

Credible. 

3. Reaction in Rationalistic Criticism on the Chronology. 

4. The Nativity of Christ as the Basis of the Christian Era. 

II. Books op the New Testament Affirmed by Enemies to be His- 
torical. 

1. The Witness of Julian, known as the Apostate, dating 362 

A.D. 

2. The Witness of Hierocles, the Instigator of Persecutions, 

303 A. D. 

3. The Witness of Porphyry, who wrote against Christian Doc- 

trines, 295. 

4. The Witness of Lucian, an Officer of the Roman Govern- 

ment, 160. 

5. The Witness of Ceisus, the Literary Champion of the 

Enemies, 150. 

6. The Witness of Tacitus to Fundamental Facts of Christian- 

ity, 110. 

7. The Witness of Josephus to the Life and Death of Christ, 

103. 

III. Testimony of the Enemies Confirmed by the Christian Writers. 

8. The Testimony of Origin of Alexandria, 254 A. D 

9. The Testimony of Tertullian, the Jurisconsult of Carthage, 

200 A. D. 

10. The Testimony of Irenseus, the Bishop of Lyons, in 170 A. D. 

11. The Testimony of Justin on "The Memoirs of the Apostles," 

140 A. D. 

12. The Testimony of Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, Phrygia 

(uncertain). 

13. The Testimony of Clement of Borne, Companion of Paul, 

64-67 A. D. 

14. The Testimony of Barnabas of Matthew's " Written" Gospel, 

70 A. D. 

IV. Some Collateral Evidence Respecting the Books of the New 

Testament. 

1. The Titles Prefixed to the several Books of these Scriptures. 

2. The Quotations made from them in Comparison with Classic 

Writers. 

3. A Table of Citations by Four Eminent Men from the whole 

New Testament. 

585 



Chapter XIX. 

VEKIFICATIOJST OF THE NEW TESTAMENT 
AS HISTOKICAL. 

§401. Sources: Biographical Epitomes of Witnesses and Literature. 

1. Papias (b. about A. D. 70), who wrote 110-116, and died about 153, 

was Bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia in the first half of the 
second century. Irenseus, mentioning certain matters, says: 
''And these things are borne witness to in a writing of Papias, 
the hearer of John, and a companion of Poly carp." (Against Here- 
sies, V, c. 33, 4.) Papias wrote a book entitled Explication of the 
Lord's Discourses (AoyLuv KvpiaicCou '~E£r)yr)<TL?), in which he has re- 
corded many historical traditions which had previously been pre- 
served in oral discourse, having been received from the apostles, 
concerning our Lord's teachings. This work was extant in the 
fifteenth century, but is now lost, except some fragments pre- 
served in the writings of Irenseus and Eusebius. Jerome also 
possessed the writings of Papias. Dr. Philip Schaff aptly remarks: 
"Papias proves the great value which was attached to the oral 
traditions of the apostles and their disciples in the second cen- 
tury. He stood on the threshold of the new period, when the 
last witnesses of the Apostolic Age were fast disappearing, and 
when it seemed to be of the utmost importance to gather the re- 
maining fragments of inspired wisdom which throw light on 
the Lord's teaching, and guard the Church against errors." 
(Hist. Christian Church. II, 696.) Besides these teachings of our 
Savior, unrecorded in the Gospels, but transmitted through his 
apostles, Papias bears witness to the existence of Matthew's Gos- 
pel, originally written in Hebrew, to Mark's Gospel, to the Book 
of Acts, to the First Epistle of Peter, the First Epistle of John, 
and to the Apocalypse. 

2. Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749-1832) in youth was carefully edu- 

cated in the languages, was well acquainted with the Bible, but 
the Scriptures exerted no influence on his spirit and life. He 
appears to have been deficient in all spiritual impressions. At the 
age of nineteen young Goethe went to the University of Leipsic 
(1768). He then became a novelist and poet, as well as a writer 
of dramas. In 1775 he became a member of the court by invita- 

587 



588 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

tion of Charles Augustus, Duke of Saxe-Weimar. He occupied 
several posts of honor in the government, and finally became 
Minister of State. Eetiring from this position, he became deeply 
interested in practical and scientific matters, studying with great 
care, Botany, Comparative Anatomy, Mineralogy, and Optics, 
making some valuable discoveries in these directions. After his 
marriage he was regarded as an authority among his people, es- 
pecially in the way of liberating the German civilization from 
the bonds of the Middle Ages. In person he was tall and re- 
markably handsome, reserved, and sometimes haughty and even 
arrogant in manner, but withal, strangely attractive in social in- 
tercourse. 

3. Samuel Pride aux Tregelles (1813-1875) was an Englishman of 

Quaker descent, who was well and classically educated. Studying 
the Oriental languages as a life-study, his first production was a 
critical edition of the text of the New Testament from the most 
ancient manuscripts and versions. He occupied no little time in 
visiting the great libraries of Europe, making scholarly researches 
with a view to subsequent productions. Some of the principal 
works from his pen are The Book of Revelation, in Connection with 
the Old Testament (1836), The Englishman's Greek Concordance of 
the New Testament (1839), The Englishman' s Hebrew and Chaldee 
Lexicon (1843), The Greek New Testament (1857-1872), and many 
others. 

4. Andrews Norton (1786-1853) was born in Massachusetts, graduated at 

Harvard University in 1804. While serving as tutor at Bowdoin, 
he delivered a course of lectures on Biblical Criticism in 1813. 
Upon the organization of the Harvard Divinity School (1819), he 
was chosen Professor of Sacred Literature, which position he re- 
signed in 1830. In theology he was a Unitarian, and wrote works 
of character against infidelity. His best production was The Genu- 
ineness of the Gospels (5 vols.), the last of which was issued 
after his death (1856). It is a critical work of invaluable worth. 

5. Arthur Penrhyn Stanley (1815-1881) was a favorite student of Dr. 

Thomas Arnold, of Rugby school, who took a number of notable 
prizes as an essayist at Oxford, graduated at the university college 
in 1838, and became Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Ox- 
ford in 1856, chaplain to the Prince of Wales in 1854, and to 
Queen Victoria in 1862. He was also distinguished for his defense 
of "free thought" in the Church of England, in the controversy 
precipitated by the publication of Bishop Colenso's work on the 
Pentateuch. Some of Dean Stanley's literary productions are Es- 
says on the Apostolic Age (1847), Epistles to the Corinthians, with 
Critical Notes (2 vols. 1855, 14th ed. 1876), Sinai and Palestine, 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 589 

Lectures on the History of the Eastern Church, and A History of the 
Jewish Church. He was a member of the British branch of the 
company who revised the translation of the Bible. 

6. George Eawlinson (b. 1815) is brother of the distinguished Sir 
Henry C. Eawlinson, who for many years was president of the 
Koyal Geographical Society; also of the Society of Biblical Ar- 
chaeology, in England. George Eawlinson graduated at Trinity 
College, Oxford, in 1839; delivered the Bampton Lectures in 1859, 
and in 1861 was chosen Professor of Ancient History at Oxford. 
He is the author of a number of very valuable works, among 
which may be named The Five Great Monarchies of the Eastern 
World (4 vols. 1862-1867), A Manual of Ancient History (1869), 
History of Egypt and Babylon (1885), and Historical Evidences of the 
Truth of the Scripture Records (New York, 1859). This last work 
is exceedingly interesting to Christians and critical scholars, as 
directed against the prevailing disbelief in the truth and authority 
of the Holy Scriptures in the present day. 

§ 402. The Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 

We have no less weighty an inquiry before us than this : Whence spring 
our Gospels ? for on the origin of these books hinge their trust- 
worthiness and all their value. . . . With the person of Jesus, 
Christianity stands or falls. — Tischendorf. 

Christianity alone of all religions claims to be founded, not on fancy or 
feeling, but on Fact and Truth.— Stanley. 

I believe the four Gospels are genuine ; for I see in them an emanation 
of that greatness which proceeded from the person of Christ, such 
as was never before manifested on earth. — Goethe. 

The sayings of Jesus, being especially characteristic of their time, have 
all the signs of an exalted and reticent originality, of a Divine 
sanctity and force; [and] bear the stamp of a spirit of develop- 
ment which no evangelist, Jew or Gentile, nor even Paul him- 
self, would have known how to invent. — Keim. 

I confess to you that the majesty of the Scriptures strikes me with 
admiration, as the purity of the Gospel has its influence upon 
my heart. It is more inconceivable that several men should have 
united to forge the Gospel than that a single person should have 
furnished the Subject of it. The marks of its truth are so striking 
and inimitable, that the inventor would be more astonishing than 
the hero. — Eousseau. 

So great is the certainty respecting the Gospels that even the heretics 
themselves testify to them, and each one of them, starting out 
from these, endeavors to establish his own doctrines. — Irekleus. 
38 



590 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

The apprehension has grown into a certainty, that the Scriptures are the 
Word of God, and are of Divine authority. — Tregelles. 

ARGUMENT. 

That the disciples of Christ wrote the four Gosples is a fact constantly 
assumed or asserted by the enemies of Christianity, especially 
during the first four centuries. In truth, they make that circum- 
stance their basis in assailing the Christian religion. This convic- 
tion is shared and amply confirmed by patristic testimony. Some 
learned extremists at first dated the several books of the New 
Testament nearly through the second Christian century ; but crit- 
icism has compelled a general retrocession in this particular. For 
these writings, though dateless as to modern methods, bear the col- 
oring of the age and antiquity of their origin. For obvious reasons 
the apostolic writers omitted their signatures to the four Gospels 
and Acts of the Apostles, while in contradistinction, the Epistles 
bear the authenticating autographs of their several writers. 
Nevertheless, so far from causing doubt of the authorship by the 
omission of signatures in case of the historical books of the New 
Testament, in the minds of contemporaries and their successors, 
foes and friends were entirely agreed in holding to the apostolicity 
of these writings as unquestioned and unquestionable. Both 
classes even mention the names of the respective writers as well 
understood. Both held that the sacred books were regarded by 
Christians as of supreme authority. Sometimes the Gospels were 
called Memoirs of Jesus. By the rules governing in cases of his- 
torical evidence, universally applicable, these books were kept and 
found in the proper custody. The numerous references to, and 
citations from, their contents furnish a complete catena of proof, 
extending from the time of Constantine the Great, through whom 
Christianity became the religion of the State, back to the period 
when the New Testament writings were written and published 
first to the world. 

1. A Retrocession made by Adverse Critics respecting the 

Dates of these Sacred Writings. 

2. The Main Facts of Christianity mentioned in the New 

Testament, attested by Enemies. 

3. The Authorship of the Several Books ascribed by Foes to 

Christ's own Disciples. 

4. Three-fourths of all the Writers of the New Testament 

are expressly named by Foes. 

5. Reasons why Writers of the Historical Books omitted to 

subscribe their Signatures. 

6. Confirmation of the Adversaries' Testimony by that of the 

Early Christian Writers. 



Verification of the Kew Testament as Historical. 591 

7. A Catena of Proofs extending from Constantine back to 

the very Apostles of Jesus. 

8. The Authenticity and Antiquity of these Scriptures 

attested by many Early Citations. 

The first three centuries of the Christian era are the old 
battleground between Christian scholarship and Destructive 
Criticism respecting the historical existence of 

1 & § 403. The 

the New Testament Scriptures, as well as of Ancient 
Christianity itself. There is no question made a egroun 
about the historicity of Christianity after its establishment as 
the religion of the State by Constantine in 325 A. D. It 
would be, therefore, a waste of labor and time to prove what 
no one denies. As the discussion of this subject is thus re- 
stricted to the first three hundred years, it is proposed to estab- 
lish a chain of proofs extending from the time of Constantine 
back to the Apostolic Age, beginning with the remotest period 
from the origin of the Christian religion, proceeding upward 
in chronology toward the apostles until we stand within hear- 
ing of their original utterances. The investigation to ascertain 
the origin, the authenticity, and historicity of these Scriptures 
is limited to this period. 

Meantime, as a point preliminary to the discussion, it is 
especially worthy of note that all living critics of learning or 
distinction, of whatever school of thought, now 

' ' „ to . ' §404. Paul's 

fully admit that Paul's first four Epistles — Four 
namely, Komans, the two Corinthians, and Gala- pi3t es ' 
tians — are truly authentic, credible and evidential. Baur used 
these very writings to assail the harmony and faith of the 
apostles' teachings. Of the thirteen Pauline Epistles, Hilgen- 
feld admits seven, and Renan nine, with Acts as genuine and 
authentic. Now, if the first four Epistles of Paul contain 
such evidential worth as claimed by Baur in his assault, they 
certainly are of equal value evidentially on the Christian side, 
for the defense. These Epistles were written A. D. 54-58. 
That is, they date within a quarter of a century after Christ's 



592 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

crucifixion. During this period nearly all the twelve apostles 
were still living, and were accessible to Paul, from whom he 
would easily and naturally learn any great facts of the per- 
sonal life and ministry of Jesus Christ. 1 Paul's conversion is 
generally placed in A. D. 37. Just before Baur's death in 
1860, he confessed that the apostle's conversion was to him 
an insolvable mystery — "amounting to a miracle." 

What, then, is the gain to Christian evidence by the univer- 
sal concession of the first four Pauline Epistles whose contents 
are held to be authentic and historical by extreme critics ? Dr. 
Philip Schaff thus briefly summarizes the conceded facts : * 

"The leading facts in the life of Christ: his Divine mission; 1 his 
birth from a woman ; 2 of the royal house of David ; 3 his holy life and 
example; 4 his betrayal, 5 passion, and death for the sins of the world; 6 
his resurrection on the third day ; 7 his repeated manifestations to his 
disciples 8 [and others]; his ascension and exaltation to the right hand 
of God, 9 whence he will return to judge mankind; 10 the adoration of 
Christ as Messiah, 11 the Lord and Savior from sin; 12 the eternal Son 
of God; 13 also the election of the Twelve, 14 the institution of Baptism, 15 
and the Lord's Supper; 16 the mission of the Holy Spirit, 17 the founding 
of the Church. 18 Among other facts may be added the account of Paul's 
conversion and call to his apostleship by the personal revelation of Jesus 
Christ ; 19 the knowledge we have of miracles wrought by the apostles 
especially by Paul ; 20 and the early controversy in the Church between 
the Judaizers from Jerusalem and the Christians of Antioch in Syria." 21 

A wonderful reaction and retrocession in the chronology of 
the New Testament is to be noted among the extreme critics 

*Hist. of Christian Church, vol. i, 213, and following. 

i Gal. iv, 4, 5. 2 lb. iv, 4. 3 Rom. i, 3. 

4 lb. xi, 16; 1 Cor. xi, 1; 2 Cor. v, 21. 5 i Cor. xi, 23. 

e Rom. v, 8-21; viii, 3; xiv, 15; 1 Cor. i, 23; ii, 2; v, 7; xv, 3; 2 Cor. v, 21; Gal,i, 4; 
iii, 13; iv, 4-6; vi, 14. 

U Cor. xv, 4, 20; Rom. i, 3; iv, 24, 25; vi, 4, 9; viii, 11; x, 7, 9; 1 Cor. vi, 14; 
Gal. i, 1. 

8 1 Cor. xv, 4-8; 45-49. s Rom. x, 6; viii, 34; 1 Cor. xv, 47. 

io Rom. i, 32; ii, 2, 16. n Rom. ix, 5; xi, 36; Gal. i, 3-5. 

i2Rom. i, 16; vi, 10; viii, 3; 1 Oor. ii, 8; xv, 3; 2Cor.v, 14,15,21; Gal. iii, 13"; 
iv, 4, 5. 

is Rom. i,3, 4; viii, 3; ix, 5; Gal. ii, 20; iv, 4. "1 Cor. xv, 5; Gal. i, 19. 

15 Rom. vi, 3-10; 1 Cor. i, 13, 14, 16; xii, 13; Gal. iii, 27. 

161 Cor. x, 16; xi, 23-26. 

17 Rom. viii, 9, 14; xi, 18; xv, 19; 1 Cor. ii, 10, 12, 14; 2 Cor. i, 22; iii, 8, 17, 

"1 Cor. iii, 11. 19 Gal. i, 1, 15, 16, 18; ii, 1-11; 1 Cor. ix, 1; xv, 8. 

20 Rom. xv, 18, 19; 1 Cor. ii, 4; ix, 2; 2 Cor. xii, 12. 

2i Gal. ii, 21 ; v, 2-4: cf. Acts xv. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 593 

of the negative school. Frederick Christian Baur, head of the 
Tubingen wing, at first dated the origin of John's Gospel at 
A. D. 170; Hilgeafeld, at 140; Keim, at 130; §405 . Reaotion 
Kenan, at 117-138. Some extremists have mod- in 

• r, -, ,, . . , , ... . n Criticism. 

lfied their own views, and some have criticised 
others as holding positions which were fictitious, uncritical, and 
untenable, especially those of the Tubingen school of criticism. 
Among the correcting critics are Pfleiderer, Ritschl, Holtz- 
mann, Lipsius, and particularly Weizsacker, Peuss, and Keim. 
Hilgenf eld affirms that " it can not be denied that Baur went 
beyond the bounds of moderation." Schenkel, after investiga- 
tion, says that he is forced to the conviction that "the Acts of 
the Apostles is a more worthy source of information than is 
commonly allowed on the part of modern criticism." Ewald 
defends Acts and the Fourth Gospel against Baur. Keim crit- 
icises Baur's views of the antagonism between Paul and Peter 
as untenable. Holtzmann is said to have placed the chronol- 
ogy of the Gospels within the period of the Apostolic Age, and 
confessed that he knew no good reason why they should not 
be accorded the dates commonly accepted (A. D. 55, 56). 
Harnack does not hesitate to place the Gospels within the 
lifetime of the apostles. " Strauss, who in his first Leben Jesu 
(1835) had represented the Gospel history as an innocent and 
unconscious myth or poem of the religious imagination of the 
second generation of Christians, but in his second Leben Jesu 
(1864) somewhat modified his views, at last (1873) gave up the 
whole as a bad job." Matthew Arnold, "one of the boldest 
and broadest of the broad-school divines and critics," regarded 
Baur as "an unsafe guide," and held that the discourses of 
John were "the sublimest of all human compositions, full of 
heavenly glories." * 

In this preliminary statement, it may be mentioned that 
the Nativity of Jesus Christ is the supreme fact that gave 
origin and authenticity to the Christian era. It so happened 

* See Schaff, Hist. Christ. Church, i, 209-217. 



594 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

in the sixth century a learned monk, named Dionysius Ex- 
iguus, endeavored to ascertain by calculation the exact year 
o„^=, m,. ^ an d day when Jesus was born at Bethlehem. 

§406. The Basis J 

of the He did not originate the era, but reckoned its 

' chronology. The result of his studies was not 
exact, but closely approximate, and perhaps the best that could 
be done with the data at his command ; for his induction was 
necessarily based upon general and indefinite terms. He was 
entirely successful in making clear and certain the fact of 
Christ's birth, but not the exact date. It was the usage of 
ancient historians to record important events as occurring 
within a certain period of time, as within the reign of a given 
emperor or ruler, which, for authenticating time, answered all 
the demands of the ancient peoples. While the year of the 
nativity can not be ascertained with absolute certitude, the 
general consensus of the scholars who have made the most 
careful investigation is to the effect that our present current 
chronology begins the Christian era about four years too late. 
It is however quite impossible practically to make the desired 
correction, since all the nations of Christendom have adopted 
the present chronology, and for so many centuries it has given 
date to all legal documents, institutions, and history. For 
every man of business now places the date of the day, month, 
and year upon all documents to give them authentic form and 
legal effect, as all banks and business houses daily attest by 
their books. But in this careful chronological notation, every 
business man recognizes and certifies to the historical exist- 
ence of Jesus Christ who furnished the origin and foundation 
to the Christian era; for it was the fact and force of his char- 
acter that swept away the more ancient chronologies of the 
nations wherever Christianity has gone and obtained a foot- 
hold. It is the introduction of a new order and course, a new 
departure in the world's history. It is the historical life of 
our Lord which gave also occasion and origin to the four Gos- 
pels: and all the Epistles and the Apocalypse of the New 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 595 

Testament are based upon that fact. If his Nativity could be 
proved to be a fiction, these Scriptures would be bankrupted 
of all their wealth of truth and significance. 

Proofs that the Books of the New Testament are 
Historical. 

It should be carefully remarked in the outset that neither 
Tacitus who lived in the first century, nor Celsus of the second 
century, nor Porphyry of the third centmy, nor 
yet Hierocles or Julian of the fourth century, ' by 
in any instance, denied the antiquity and apos- 
tolicity of the several books of the New Testament. Upon 
the contrary, they distinctly affirm these particulars, making 
many references to these writings as reliable, and somotimes 
even correctly mention the author's names. And what is the 
more remarkable is the circumstance, that while thus recog- 
nizing the authorship of the Evangelists and apostles in the 
Gospels and Epistles, in no instance did these adversaries of 
Christianity make a citation from any book of the Apocryphal 
or spurious books of the New Testament, as being authorita- 
tive either for themselves or for the Christians. That is, these 
adversaries themselves discriminated between the apostolic 
and the spurious writings which arose in the middle of the 
second Christian century. 

What, then, had these enemies of the Christian religion to 
say respecting the historicity of these books of Scripture, of 
which they made so much ? Let us begin with a Roman Em- 
peror of the fourth century, whose testimony will serve as a 
connecting link in the chain of evidence extending from the 
Christianity which is acknowledged to be historical, back to 
the life and labors of the apostles. I refer to — 

1. Julian, known as "the Apostate" (b. A. D. 331), who 
assumed the purple and the crown in the year 361. That this 
emperor was an enemy of Christianity can not be denied, as 
his literary works, his edicts, letters, and orations abundantly 



596 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

prove. He was pleased to call Jesus "the Galilean," and 
Christians "the Galileans." Having deposed the Christian 
bishop, Athanasius, he banished him from Egypt ; whereupon 
the Christians, in the name of the city of Alexandria, peti- 
tioned Julian for the bishop's return and restoration to office. 
This was his reply: 

" By the gods, ye men of Alexandria, I am ashamed that any Alex- 
andrian should acknowledge himself a Galilean. Alexander, the Ptol- 
emies, and other princes, their founders and patrons, were worshipers of 
the gods, and had not raised their constitution to its grandeur by the 
words of Jesus, nor by the doctrine of the hateful Galileans/' " By the 
madness of the Galileans, all things are brought to the brink of ruin ; 
and now we are all safe by the goodness of the gods.' 5 " Forbear to con- 
verse with servants, children, and wives of the Galileans, who are impi- 
ous towards the gods, and prefer impiety to religion." " We ought to 
pity rather than hate men who suffer the greatest calamity ; for indeed 
true religion [idolatry] is the greatest good, and, on the contrary, impi- 
ety is the greatest of evils ; which calamity they bring upon themselves, 
who, forsaking the immortal gods, betake themselves to dead men." 22 

About A. D. 362, Julian witnessed to the account of certain 
facts as being authentic, which are mentioned in the history of 
Jesus and his apostles : The birth of Christ ; its connection with 
the enrollment of Cyrenius ; his incarnation ; the miracles of 
Jesus and Paul ; the Four Gospels, whose authors are named ; 
Acts of the Apostles ; the Epistles to the Romans ; both Epistles 
to the Corinthians ; that to the Galatians, and the First Epistle 
of Peter. That is, he cites the foregoing facts, perverting the 
most of them ; but he actually names five of the seven or 
eight authors of the New Testament. The following citations 
will sufficiently prove, not only the existence of the sacred 
books in the time of Julian, but also the facts found in their 
contents. 

a) Birth of Christ. " Jesus whom you celebrate was one of Csesar's 
subjects. If you dispute it, I will prove it. . . . For yourselves 
allow that he was enrolled with his father and mother in the time of 
Cyrenius." "But Jesus having persuaded a few among you, and those 
the worst of men, has now been celebrated about three hundred 



22 Cited from the original in Lardner's Works, vii, 643, 596, 645, 651. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 597 

years." 23 This testimony witnesses, (1) To the antiquity of the Nativ- 
ity ; (2) Places the event within the reign of Augustus Caesar ; (3) Con- 
nects Christ's birth with the first enrollment of Cyrenius, which is now 
shown to have occurred B. C. 4; (4) And finally, that what he says, the 
Christians themselves maintain ; but if they dispute it, he will prove 
it — presumably by their own sacred books, which he obviously had in his 
possession, and from which he makes not a few citations, as will be seen. 
j3) Christ's Incarnation. Julian adds respecting the Christians: 
"They say they agree with Isaiah who prophesieth, 'Behold a Virgin 
shall conceive and shall bear a son/ " But " she was not a virgin who 
was married. . . . Grant [however] that this is said of him [Jesus], 
does he say that God should be born of a virgin? But they are contin- 
ually calling Mary the Mother of God." " Neither is he of Judah ; and 
how should he be when, according to you, he was not born of Joseph, 
but of the Holy Ghost." 24 "When you reckon up the genealogy of 
Joseph, you carry it up to Judah ; but you have not been able to contrive 
this dexterously ; for Matthew and Luke have been shown to differ with 
one another about the genealogy." 25 

The interesting question here is, How did Julian know 
what Matthew and Luke say about the genealogy of Jesus 
or Joseph, and how did he know that they differed from 
each other, and that both continued the line back to Judah, 
unless those Gospels were in existence and were at that time in 
Julianas possession f It is true that the two genealogical tables 
do differ; and it was intentional, for different purposes. 
Matthew, writing for the Jews, cites the Jewish Scriptures to 
prove their predictions of the Messiah fulfilled in Christ, and 
accordingly must trace his descent along the royal line, from 
David down. On the other hand, Luke, writing for the Gen- 
tiles, omitted the Jewish argument, and showed his natural 
descent, in that he was the Redeemer of all mankind. Each 
one, therefore, conducted his special argument for the instruc- 
tion and persuasion of those for whom he specially wrote. 

7) Books of the New Testament. " For neither Paul, Matthew, Mark, 
nor Luke has dared to call Jesus God. But honest John, understanding 
that a great multitude of men in the cities of Greece and Italy were 
seized with this distemper, and hearing likewise, as I suppose, that the 
tombs of Peter and Paul were respected and frequented, ... he 

23 Lardner's Works, vii, 626, 627. 24 j , 629, 625. 

25 lb. 625; comp. Matt, i, 18, 20; Luke i, 35. 



598 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

then presumed to advance that doctrine." 26 " How, then, is Jesus said 
in the Gospels to command, ' Go teach all nations, baptizing them in the 
name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost? 5 " 27 " When 
a certain disciple said, Lord, suffer me to go and bury my father, he 
answered : Follow thou me, and let the dead bury their dead." 28 

Here Julian mentions " the Gospels" as such, cites several 
passages from them, and names properly five of the seven or 
eight writers of the New Testament. He also argues from 
the passages which he quotes. To find these Scriptures in the 
hands of enemies who have studied and become familiar with 
them, and argued from them, implies that the antiquity, 
authorship, as well as the historical existence of these writings 
are acknowledged by such adversaries. But no spurious writing 
known as "apocryphal," which appeared in the middle of the 
second century, is cited as authoritative. 

Julian next refers to an early Christian movement in their 
care of the poor, which is recorded in Acts : a 

" It having so happened, as I suppose, that the poor were neglected 
by our priests, the impious Galileans, observing this, have addicted 
themselves to this kind of humanity, and, by the show of such good 
offices, have recommended the worst of things. For beginning with 
their love-feasts and ministry of the tables, as they call it — for not only 
the name but the thing itself is common among them — they have drawn 
away the faithful to impiety." 

The emperor evidences a familiar knowledge of at least five 
Epistles of the New Testament. Thus he refers to Romans:® 

" Do you [Christians] show me some place where that is said which 
is affirmed by Paul with so much assurance, that Christ is the end of the 
law." And again Julian asks the Christians: "Why are you not circum- 
cised ? To which they answer: Paul says, It is the circumcision of the 
heart, not that of the flesh." 

First Corinthians: 31 "They say [i. e., the Christians], We can not 
keep the feast of unleavened bread or the passover, because Christ has 
once been sacrificed for us." "Be not deceived: neither idolaters, nor 
adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, 
nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, shall inherit the 

ss Lardner's Works, vii, 628, 629. 27 jb. 637; comp. Matt, xxviii, 19. 

28/6. 637; comp. Matt, viii, 21, 22; Luke ix, 59, 60. 
29 Acts vi, 1-7; Lard, vii, 645, 646. so Rom. x, 4; Lard, vii, 633. 

si 1 Cor. v, 7; Lard, vii, 633, 634; 1 Cor. vi, 9-11 ; Lard, vii, 634, 635; 1 Cor, viii, 7-10; 
Lard, vii, 638. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 599 

kingdom of God. And you are not ignorant, brethren, that such were 
you also. But ye are washed, but ye are sanctified in the name of Jesus 
Christ." He says: " You see they were such ; but they had been sancti- 
fied and washed, having been cleansed and scoured with water, which 
penetrates even to the soul. And baptism, which can not heal the leprosy, 
nor the gout, nor dysentery, nor any other distemper of the body, takes 
away adulteries, extortions, and all other sins of the soul." "Why do 
you meddle with the Greek learning, since the reading of your own 
Scriptures is sufficient for you ? And, indeed, it might be of more im- 
portance to restrain men from reading the Greek authors than from eat- 
ing things sacred to idols. For by that also Paul says, ' He that eats is 
not hurt. But the conscience of the brother who sees it, is offended/ 
according to you." 

Galatians : ffi Cyril, who reviewed and refuted the work of 
Julian against the Christians, makes this notation, which 
evidences Julian's knowledge of this Epistle : 

" And moreover this daring gentleman reviles the chief of the apos- 
tles, Peter, and says he was a hypocrite, and was reproved by Paul for 
living sometimes after the manner of the Greeks, and at other times 
after the manner of the Jews." 

The Scriptures here collated are by no means exhaustive of 
Julian's citations and references ; but they are sufficient, and 
demonstrative of the fact that these writings existed pre- 
viously, and now were in the hands alike of friends and foes 
who were familiar with their contents. 

8) Miracles . Julian did not deny the historicity of mira- 
cles, but he tried to minify and disparage them as evidence of 
Christ's divine authority, by paralleling his works by those of 
the magicians. 33 John Chrysostom (347-407), after mention- 
ing that when Christianity had become established, in com- 
parison with the beginning, miracles were less frequent, 
says : " Yet in our time, in the reign of Julian, who surpassed 
all men in impiety there were many miracles." 34 Julian 
says of Jesus: 

" Who rebuked the winds, and walked on the seas, and cast out de- 
mons, and, as you will have it, made the heaven and the earth." And 
again: " But Jesus having persuaded a few among you, . . . hav- 

39 Lardner's Works, ii, 11, 12, 633. 33 Lard, vii, 622, 627. 

3 * Homily on Matt. iv,,§2, vol. x. p. 21 . 



600 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ing done nothing in his lifetime worthy of remembrance, unless one 
thinks it a mighty matter to heal lame and blind people, and exorcise 
demoniacs in the villages of Bethsaida and Bethany." " Paul exceeded 
all the jugglers and impostors that ever were." ^ 

If, now, we move upward in the stream of time about sixty 
years toward the apostles, we have the testimony of 

2. Hierocles, the prefect of Alexandria, born about A. D. 
253, and ruled in Egypt in 303, during the terrible persecution 
of Dioclesian which was ordered that year against the Chris- 
tians, of which persecution Hierocles was the chief instigator. 
That he, in common with other intelligent heathen, was 
familiar with these Christian Scriptures, and knew that they 
were held in reverential authority by the Church, is obvious 
from several considerations. One is, that for the first time in 
the history of heathen persecution, the Christians were re- 
quired to bring forward and burn in public their sacred books, 
under penalty of being burned. Now, evidently they must 
have existed previously, or they could not be burned ; and it 
were foolish to suppose that the government ordered that to be 
burned which did not exist! This circumstance in a large 
sense accounts for the fact that we have now no earlier 
manuscripts of the Creek text than A. D. 325. Hierocles 
witnesses to the genuineness of these Scriptures when he re- 
fers to at least five of the writers of the New Testament. He 
seeks to disparage the writers of the sacred books, but in no 
instance disputes the genuineness or the antiquity of the writ- 
ings. Rather, he accepts them as being apostolical, but 
indulges in reviling the apostles, instead of refuting them. He 
wrote a work entitled " To the Christians" instead of against 
the Christians. A professional philosopher, teaching philoso- 
phy, without understanding the character of Christianity, he 
indulges in the unphilosophical spirit in denouncing it as "a 
superstition," as "foolish," "impious, neglecting the deities by 
whom the world is governed," " contrary to the established 

35 Lard, vii, pp. 627, 622. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 601 

laws," " prejudicial to the interests of mankind," and " expos- 
ing men to the displeasure of the gods." 36 Lactantius, who 
refuted Hierocles's work, says: 

"This writer endeavors to overthrow Christ's miracles, though he 
does not deny the truth of them ; he aims to show that like things, and 
even greater, were done by Apollonius. He says: 'Christ, it seems, 
must be reckoned a magician, because he did many wonderful things ; 
but Apollonius is more able, because, . . . when Domitian would 
have put him to death, he escaped [' vanishing away at his trial before 
Domitian in the presence of all the great men of Eome ' ] ; 'whereas, 
Christ was apprehended and crucified.'" 37 Hierocles says : "It is also 
reasonable to think that the actions of Jesus have been magnified by 
Peter and Paul and others like them [i. e., the four Evangelists] ; igno- 
rant men, liars and impostors." ^ " They are continually crying up 
Jesus for opening the eyes of the blind and other like works." 39 
" Christ must be reckoned a magician, because he did many wonderful 
things." 40 " We do not esteem [Apollonius], who did these things as a 
god, but a man favored by the gods ;" "whereas they, for the sake of a 
few tricks, call Jesus God." " Jesus ascended into heaven." 41 

Huet is the authority for the statement that " Philostratus 
transferred many things from the history of Christ into his 
Life of Apollonius," a the work upon which Hierocles founded 
his writing assailing Christianity. Now as to Hierocles : 

1. To criticise the writings of Peter and Paul, implies he had them 
then in his possession. 

2. He does not deny the genuineness of their writings, but rather 
affirms their authorship. 

3. He seeks to disparage their good fame by calling names: " igno- 
rant men, liars, impostors." 

4. He affirms Christ's miracles in his " giving sight to the blind, and 
other such works." 

5. He explains miracles by saying: "He must be a magician, for 
he did many wonderful tricks." 

6. He seems amazed at the Christians, "who, for the sake of a few 
tricks, call Jesus God." 

7. After all his disparagements, Hierocles admits that "Jesus as- 
cended into heaven." 

We are now within the era of the first three hundred years 
after the crucifixion, and considerably less than that after the 

30 Lard. vii. 474. 37 26.476,512. 88 2 6.479. 39/5.478. 

to lb . 476. « lb. 478, 479, 494 « lb. 493. 



602 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

writing of nearly all the books of the New Testament. Most 
of these sacred writers are named and known; the capital 
facts of Christ's history — namely, the crucifixion and his as- 
cension into heaven — are acknowledged by adversaries; his 
miraculous powers are admitted in having opened the eyes of 
the blind, and other such signs and wonders. They also note 
with express displeasure that the Christians call Jesus God. 
The next adverse witness is — 

3. Porphyry, who was born at Tyre, in Phoenicia, in the year 
233, and wrote about 295. He is named "Bataneotes" by 
both Jerome and Chrysostom. 43 He is said to have been a 
schoolfellow of the famous Christian scholar, Origen. 44 Socra- 
tes in his Ecclesiastical History mentions Porphyry as having 
once been a Christian ; but by reason of having been beaten 
by some Christians at Caesarea, he renounced Christianity, 
and became one of its most ardent and noted enemies. 45 He 
wrote Against the Doctrines of the Christians® a work in 
fifteen books, mere fragments of which now remain. By the 
imperial edict of Constantine it was consigned to the flames, 
and his name and fame made infamous. In a letter the em- 
peror says : 

"As Arius has imitated the impious and profane, it is but just that 
he should undergo the same infamy with him. As therefore Porphyry, 
that enemy of true piety, has received a fit reward for his impious writ- 
ings against religion, so that he is made infamous to all future times, 
and covered with reproach, and his impious writings have been de- 
stroyed," 47 etc. 

Theodosius the younger, in A. D. 449, abolished the few 
remaining copies which had escaped the fire. 48 

Porphyry refers distinctly to Matthew, Mark, John, and 
Acts, as well as to several of the Pauline Epistles. The sev- 
eral writers of the Gospels are thus mentioned : 



« Lard, vii, 392. « Mill., lb. 393. « Lib. iii, c. 23, p. 200; see Lard, vii, 392, 393. 

46 Kara xP La " rLav & v ^-oyovg-. 

« Socrates, Ecel. Hist. 1, i, c. ix, p. 32; cited by Lard, vii, 895. 

48 lard, vii, 396. 



Verification of the E"ew Testament as Historical. 603 

"Your Evangelist Matthew was so ignorant as to say," etc. ; and 
again in the plural number: "The Evangelists, the better to impose 
a miracle upon the ignorant people, say: 'Our Lord walked on the 
sea.' " 49 He cites John's Gospel thus: " If Christ be the way of salva- 
tion, the Truth and the Life, and only those who believe in him can be 
saved, what became of the men who lived before his coming?" 50 "If 
the Son of God be Word, he must be either outward word, or inward 
word. But he is neither this nor that. Therefore he is not the 
Word." 61 

He also refers to several incidents in Paul's experience 
which are recorded in the Book of Acts, such as the circumcis- 
ion of Timothy, 52 the apostle's vow at Cenchrea, 53 and his con- 
duct at Jerusalem by the advice of James, the Lord's brother, 
in order to disarm certain Jews of their charges against the 
apostle. 54 Porphyry also cites the First Epistle to Corinthians : 
" Unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the 
Jews." 55 He refers also to two circumstances which Paul has 
recorded in respect to his relations with Peter in the Epistle 
to the Galatians. The first reference is to Paul's going to 
Jerusalem and conferring only with Peter and James. 56 Por- 
phyry censures Paul for not conferring with the other apostles 
also! Kef erring to the disputation between Paul and Peter 
at Antioch, when Paul "withstood Peter to the face, because 
he was to be blamed," Porphyry asserts that " Peter and Paul 
had a childish quarrel with one another, and that Paul burned 
with envy at the virtues of Peter, and had written in a boast- 
ing manner of things which either he never did, or, if he did, 
it was mere peevishness to blame that in another which he 
had been guilty of himself." 57 

Porphyry admits that the apostles wrought miracles. He 

says: 

" Ignorant and indigent men, because they had nothing, performed 
some signs by magical art — which is no great matter, for the magicians 
in Egypt, and many others, have wrought signs. Let it be granted, as 



«> Lard, vii, 424, 425. 50 lb. 439. si j&. 427, 428. 

52 Acts xvi, 1-3. 53 i"6. xviii, 18. <*i b. xxi, 18-24. 

65 1 Cor. ix, 20 ; Lard, vii, 431. 56 Gal. i, 17-19. 
vib. ii, 11-21; comp. Lard, vii, 431. 



604 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

you say, the apostles wrought signs, that they might enrich themselves 
with the treasures of rich women whom they had perverted." 68 "And 
now people wonder that this distemper has oppressed the city so many 
years, iEsculapius and the other gods no longer conversing with men. 
For since Jesus has been honored, none have received any public bene- 
fits from the gods !" 69 

This adversary of Christianity tries to criticise those who 
interpreted the Divine Word. He says : 

"An example of this absurd method may be observed in a man 
whom I saw when I was very young, who was then in great esteem, and 
is so still, for the writings which he has left behind him ; I mean Origen, 
whose authority is very great with the teachers of this doctrine. . . . 
But Origen, a Greek, and educated in the Greek sentiment, went over to 
the barbarian temerity , m to which he devoted himself, and corrupted 
. . . the principles of literature which he had received ; as to his life, 
living a Christian and contrary to the laws." 61 

To the credit of Porphyry it is said that, whatever his 
opposition to the apostles and the Christians, he invariably 
referred to Jesus Christ in terms of real respect. Colonia says : 

" He makes the goddess Hecate say, and he acknowledges himself, 
that Jesus Christ is a man illustrious for his piety, and that he is more 
powerful than iEsculapius and all the other [Greek] gods." 62 Dr. Dod- 
dridge says: " Porphyry also, though an inveterate enemy to Christian- 
ity, not only allowed there was such a man as Christ, but honored him 
as a most wise and pious man, translated into heaven as being approved by 
the gods, and accordingly quotes some Oracles referring to his sufferings 
and virtues, with their subsequent rewards." 63 

We shall now advance upward to a period within a century 
of the publication of the books of the New Testament. The 
first witness for that time is — 

4. Lucian, of Samasota in Syria, born A. D. 124. He was 
an important officer of the Roman Government at Alexandria, 
in Egypt. He wrote a letter to one Cronius respecting the 
death of a certain Pereginus, otherwise called Proteus, who, 



58 Jerome, cited by Lard. 442. 

6 9 Euseb. Evang. Preparation, cited by Lard. 437, 488. 

^T 6 fidpfiapov £%u)K€i\€ rbX/xrjua = lit. " drove headlong in the barbarian ad- 
venture. 1 ' 

6i Euseb. Eccl. Hist., cited in Lard, vii, 397. 
62 Cited in Lard, vii, 445. 63 lb. 446. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 605 

in the sixth decade of the second century, immediately after 
the celebration of the sacred Olympic games, publicly burned 
himself to death " in the eyes of all Greece." Although he 
represents Paul in terms of disrespect, he pays a tribute of 
praise to Christ and the Christians generally of that period. 
He says: 

" It is incredible what expedition they use when any of their friends 
are known to be in trouble. In a word, they spare nothing upon such an 
occasion." " They also have a sovereign contempt for the things of this 
world, and trust one another with them without any particular secu- 
rity." "For these miserable men have no doubt that they shall be 
immortal, and live forever ; therefore they contemn death, and many 
surrender themselves to sufferings." "They still worship that great 
man who was crucified in Palestine, because he introduced into the 
world this new religion." " Moreover, their first Lawgiver taught them 
that they were all brethren when once they have turned and renounced 
the gods of the Greeks, and worship that Master of theirs who was cru- 
cified, and engage to live according to his laws." M 

"When the Galilean, half bald, long nosed, who traveled through 
the air to the third heaven, and there learned the most extraordinary 
things, came to me, he renewed us by water. ... I entreat you, 
. . . though, with your Master, you should be taken up and admitted 
to unspeakable mysteries." 65 

The references to the Scriptures are to Acts, Corinthians, 
and apparently to other Pauline Epistles, as Philippians and 
Titus, also to Hebrews, and frequently to the Book of Life in 
Revelation. 

A SUMMARY. 

A summary may now be given of the points in evidence 
furnished by the last three adversaries of the Christian religion. 

1. Hierocles affirms the miracles of Jesus; admits that he 
ascended into heaven ; and that the Christians in his period, 
and earlier, were accustomed to deify Jesus Christ. He also 
acknowledges the apostolic authorship of Peter and Paul, of 
Matthew, Luke, and John, in respect to the several Gospels, 
Acts, and the Pauline Epistles to the Corinthians and the Ga- 
latians. Thus five of the seven or eight writers of the New 

64 Lard, vii, 280, 279. « lb. 287. 

39 



606 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Testament are named and admitted, as already in his own 
possession. 

2. Porphyry mentions Christ's character and power in 
strong commendation; acknowledges that he wrought many 
miracles ; affirms that he was superior to all the heathen gods 
whom he worshiped, and, finally, that Jesus ascended into 
heaven. Kef erring to the Gospels, he expressly calls the 
writers "the Evangelists," cites directly from the Gospels of 
Matthew and John, and makes specific references to Acts, 
Corinthians, and to Galatians. Moreover, he admits the 
authorship of Peter and Paul, and acknowledges the miracles 
of the apostles after Christ's ascension. 

3. Lucian states the capital fact that Christ was crucified 
in Palestine, and the reason of the fact, "because he intro- 
duced into the world this new religion." He was therefore 
recognized by adversaries as the Founder of Christianity. He 
also alludes to Paul's description of "a certain man" who was 
carried up to the third heaven and heard things unspeakable. 
Eeference is made to Acts, Corinthians, possibly to Philippians 
and Titus, but particularly to Hebrews and Kevelation. 

4. So these writings existed in the middle of the second 
century as authoritative with the Christians, and the several 
incidents alluded to were known from those Scriptures by the 
enemies of Christianity. That other writings of the New 
Testament are not mentioned or referred to, by no means jus- 
tifies the inference that they were not in existence, but rather 
that the adversary writing, in his purpose had no occasion to 
use them. And of that, he was the sole judge. No Chris- 
tian writer, even, on any occasion whatever, is expected to 
refer to, or make citations from, all the books of these Scrip- 
tures. 

5. Celsus, born about A. D. 110, or earlier, and wrote about 
150, was the literary champion of those who assailed the 
Christian religion in their writings. He unintentionally and 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 607 

inadvertently furnishes an invaluable witness to the sacred 
writings, as well as their authorship, in his open and active 
hostility to Christ and Christianity. For he claims to have 
made these books of the New Testament the exclusive source 
of his information respecting Jesus and his doctrines. Never- 
theless, it is said of Celsus that he took counsel of the Jews of 
his period, and shared in their prejudice and hate of the 
Christians and their religion. Be that as it may, it is in evi- 
dence throughout his work, Celsus not only assumes, but abso- 
lutely affirms and reiterates, that the disciples of Christ wrote 
the four Gospels which he takes for his exclusive written author- 
ity in opposition. This fact he constantly exploits. Bishop 
Westcott justly remarks : 

" Celsus quotes the writings of the disciples concerning his life as 
possessing unquestioned authority ; and that these were the four canon- 
ical Gospels is proved both by the absence of all evidence to the con- 
trary, and by the special facts which he brings forward. And not only 
this, but both Celsus and Porphyry appear to have been acquainted with 
the Pauline Epistles/' 66 

From the use which is made by this adversary of Chris- 
tianity, it is obvious and evident that these Scriptures were the 
only books which he relied upon as being authoritative with 
the Christians. It is easy to prove the identity of the books 
which he cites with our own canonical Gospels, by an appeal 
to the facts and doctrines found in their contents. For Celsus 
is clear and express in terms, tracing the history of Jesus, en- 
larging upon the capital facts of his life, such as His Nativity, 
His Baptism, His Ministry, His Miracles, His Death, and His 
Eesurrection, all in exact accordance with our canonical Gos- 
pels. Lardner states that there are no less than eighty pas- 
sages of our Scriptures alluded to and cited by this disbeliever. 
A limited number of instances, illustrative of the whole, are 
sufficient to determine the identity of our Gospels in contents 
with those used by this inveterate enemy. Except in the form 

66 Canon of N. T., pp. 404, 405. 



608 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

of citations made at a later date than the writing of the Gos- 
pels, these various facts are not found in any work in the world 
of literature. 

§ 408. Internal Evidence. 

These facts particularized are : 

1. That Jesus descended from the Jewish kings. 

2. That his birth was of a virgin mother. 

3. That he was born in a village in Judsea. 

4. That Joseph was suspicious of Mary's chastity. 

5. That at length Mary married the carpenter. 

6. That a Star appeared at the time of Christ's birth. 

7. That certain Wise Men came to do him homage. 

8. That Herod slew young children at Bethlehem. 

9. That an Angel directed the flight of the family. 

10. That thereupon the family took refuge in Egypt. 

11. That finally they returned to their home in Nazareth. 

12. That Celsus thence calls Jesus Christ " a Nazarene." 

13. That subsequently he underwent the rite of baptism. 

14. That the Spirit then descended in the form of a dove. 

15. That a Voice also was heard descending from heaven. 

16. That Jesus then became known as a public Teacher. 

17. That he was Leader in the " sedition from the Jews." 

18. That he collected a number of disciples about him. 

19. That he healed the lame and blind, and raised the dead 

20. That he was really betrayed by one of his disciples. 

21. That he was publicly denied by another disciple. 

22. That the Jews instigated Christ's condemnation. 

23. That he was robed in purple and derided by men. 

24. That he was also crowned with thorns and mocked. 

25. That he was offered gall and vinegar to drink. 

26. That the death of Christ was due to crucifixion. 

27. That his disciples at once claimed his resurrection. 

28. That a preternatural darkness prevailed at his death. 

29. That Celsus refers to the earthquake without denial. 

30. That an Angel rolled away the great stone at his tomb. 

31. That Jesus showed himself alive after his resurrection. 

32. That Jesus Christ was the Founder of Christianity. 

33. That the disciples of Jesus wrote his life in the Gospels, etc. 

Here are no less than thirty-three important facts alluded 
to in the work of Celsus which he entitled A True Dis- 
course,® as quoted by Origen, who refuted him. Yery many 

67 A6yo? ' AXridr)? . 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 609 

other instances of his reference to the sacred books could be 

adduced, if they were called for. But these substantiate the 

induction that this adversary was using our Scriptures, and 

more proof in that direction would be redundant. Nor did 

Celsus confine himself strictly to the four Gospels ; for, as Dr. 

Lardner remarks : 

" Celsus . . . had read, as it seems, all the books of the New 
Testament, but when he had done that, he supposed that he need not 
give himself much trouble about any of them, except the historical 
books, particularly the Gospels." 68 

It is quite probable that Celsus thought that if he could 
succeed in destroying the power of Christ's life, the epistolary 
teachings, which are but expositions of that life, would fall 
with the Gospels. At any rate, Professor Keim has succeeded 
in reconstructing the original work of Celsus against the 
Christians, from the large and exact citations which Origin 
made in order thoroughly to answer him. 69 

A few decisive cases must stand for the many 

J §409. Author- 

which prove that Celsus assumed, asserted, and ship of the 

insisted that the writers of the Gospels were no 

others than Chrises own disciples. This proves the authenticity 

and antiquity of these writings : 

a) That the disciples of Jesus did record the facts and 

teachings of his life. 

" Jesus with his own voice expressly declares, as you yourselves have 
recorded, that there will appear among others, [those] also who will per- 
form miracles." "He distinctly declares with his own voice, as you 
yourselves have recorded, that there will come to you, even others employ- 
ing miracles." 70 

j8) That the disciples wrote the Gospels to relieve Jesus of 

certain charges. 

" The disciples of Jesus wrote such accounts regarding him by way of 
extenuating the charges which told against him." 71 

7) That Celsus himself used these Books as being unques- 
tionably authoritative. 

es Lard, vii, 263. « 9 Schaff , Person of Christ, p. 199, n. 

to Origen contra Celsum, ii, 53, 49. 71 lb. ii, 16. 



610 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

"All these statements are taken from your own books, in addition to 
which we need no other witness ; you fall by your own swords." 72 

8) That certain heretics had effected alterations in the text of 
the Gospels. 

" That certain of the Christian believers, . . . having corrupted 
the Gospels from their original integrity, to a threefold, and fourfold, 
and many-fold degree, and having remodeled it, so that they might be 
able to answer objections," 73 etc. 

c) Gelsus claims that he suppressed some things he Jcneio 
derogatory of Jesus. 

" I could say many things concerning the affairs of Jesus, and those 
too true, different from those written by the disciples of Jesus. But I pur- 
posely omit them." 74 

So far Celsus. This shrewd and keen antagonist of the 
Christians admits incontestably, and even directly ascribes the 
writing of these books of the New Testament to the disciples 
of Christ, and to no others, relying upon these writings as his 
sole authority for both friends and ^foes, wherewith to assail 
the Christian religion and refute the Christians. There is no 
evidence that any person at that time believed any otherwise. 
The rankest disbeliever of his period did not attempt to dis- 
pute the authorship of these writings, which he himself pos- 
sessed, and had evidently studied with the greatest care. 
Thus upon the witness of one who was the champion of the ene- 
mies of Christianity, the authenticity and antiquity of the sa- 
cred hooks are placed beyond recall. For, as remarked by the 
famous Chrysostom: "Celsus and Bataneotes [i. <?., Porphyry] 
are sufficient witnesses to the antiquity of our books; for I 
presume they did not oppose writings which had been pub- 
lished since their own time." 75 They lived within a century of 
the publication of these sacred books, and were in a position 
to know what they were writing about, quite as well as one 
living two thousand years afterwards. It is a very remarka- 
ble circumstance that after having named about all the main 



72 Origen contra Celsum, ii, 74. " j , u, 27. 

*i&. ii, 13. 75 Ohrys. Homily vi, on 1 Cor. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 611 

facts which occurred in our Lord's life, from his Nativity to 
his resurrection, Celsus affirms and reiterates these propositions : 

1. "Jesus . . . declares as you yourselves have recorded." 

2. " The disciples of Jesus wrote such accounts regarding him." 

3. "All these statements are taken from your own books." 

4. " Certain . . . Christian believers . . . corrupted the Gos- 
pels from their original integrity." 

5. " I could say many things concerning the affairs of Jesus . . . 
different from those written by the disciples of Jesus." 

The charge of Celsus that certain believers had corrupted 
the Gospels of their original integrity is quite true. Near the 
middle of the second century, Cerinthus, Yalentius, and Mar- 
cion, and others who were denounced as heretics in conse- 
quence, did mutilate these Scriptures to adapt them to their 
own preconceived notions of how they should read and what 
they should teach; and this high-handed procedure aroused 
the just indignation of the Church, and called forth protests 
and condemnation from Justin Martyr, Tertullian, and other 
defenders of the faith. But all this distinctly proves that there 
were "written oooks" existing at that time to corrupt, and such 
as had "their original integrity" which was liable to be cor- 
rupted. But not all nor most of these Scriptures, by any 
means, underwent this mutilation and corruption. But the 
uncorrupted manuscripts and versions which have come down 
to us prove the identity of the Scriptures used by Celsus with 
our own, by his numerous citations. This adversary makes 
" plain references to Matthew, Luke, and John, and probably 
Mark also ;" and he refers to several of Paul's Epistles, if not 
to the Epistles of St. Peter and St. John. 76 And, without ex- 
ception, all these writings are attributed to apostolic writers. 

6. Tacitus, born A. D. 61 or earlier, and wrote in the first 
decade of the second century or before. This man of fame is 
adduced as a witness respecting a single fact which is funda- 
mental to the authenticity of these sacred books and to the 
whole system of Christianity. Yery high authority represents 

76 Dr. Lardner, vii, 223, 224. 



612 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Tacitus as " the famous Roman historian who ranks beyond dis- 
pute in the highest place among men of letters of all ages, who 
lived in the latter half of the first, and in the early part of the 
second, century of our era." In the reference which this histo- 
rian makes to the great conflagration which nearly consumed 
all Eome in A. D. 54, ordered by the Emperor Nero, who laid his 
own crime upon the defenseless Christians that he might escape 
the terrible indignation and vengeance of an infuriated popu- 
lace, Tacitus mentions "the persons commonly called Chris- 
tians;" and that "Christ, the Founder of that name was put 
to death as a criminal by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Ju- 
daea, in the reign of Tiberius 77 [Caesar]." 

Respecting the character and credibility of this brief par- 
agraph, the celebrated author of the Decline and Fall of the 
Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon, one of the worst enemies of 
Christianity in his century, thus attests : 

"The most skeptical criticism is obliged to respect the truth of this 
extraordinary fact, and the integrity of this celebrated passage of Taci- 
tus. The former [the truth] is confirmed by the diligent and accurate 
Suetonius, who mentions the punishment which Nero inflicted on the 
Christians, a sect of men who had embraced ' a new and criminal super- 
stition.' The latter [the integrity] may be proved by the consent of the 
most ancient manuscripts ; by the inimitable character of the style of 
Tacitus ; by his reputation, which guarded his text from the interpola- 
tions of pious frauds," 78 etc. 

"What fact or facts attested by Tacitus, and unqualifiedly 
indorsed by Gibbon, are here brought to view? These, namely: 

1. The historical existence of Jesus Christ whom Tacitus names. 

2. That Jesus was known and named as the Founder of the Christian 
religion. 

3. That he was supposed to have been executed in the character of a 
criminal. 

4. That he was put to death by the Roman officer, Pontius Pilate. 

5. That Pilate was at that time the procurator of the Province Judaea. 

6. That the death of Jesus Christ occurred in the reign of Tiberius. 

7. That Christ had disciples in " the persons commonly called Chris- 
tians." 



v Annals, xv, 44. ™ Vol. I, p. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 613 

Now, it is perfectly evident from this testimony of Tacitus, 
giving these cardinal facts, that the narrative of Christ's 
earthly life was no myth ; for all the characteristics of history 
blend in this one remarkable attestation: the personal subject, 
Christ ; his work, the Founder of Christianity ; the peculiarity 
of his death, as a criminal; the name of the ruler who sen- 
tenced him, Pilate : the character of his Roman office, procu- 
rator; the province where it occurred, Judaea; the time when 
he was executed, in the reign of Tiberius; the sect that assumed 
Christ's name, the Christians. These facts so distinctly stated by 
this eminent Roman historian are perfectly consistent with 
each other, and are in exact accord with the statements given 
in the Gospels respecting Christ's death. And since books which 
narrate facts are declared to be historical, these books of the 
New Testament are historical. Tacitus was the contemporary 
of the Apostle John; so this writer stands within the Apos- 
tolic Age. 

The testimony of the last of the adverse witnesses is that of 

7. Josephus, the Jewish priest and historian, born near 

the time of the crucifixion, in A. D. 37. His work, entitled 

Jewish Antiquities* contains ten facts in one paragraph, all 

which are found in the historical New Testament. 79 He says: 

"Now there was about this time a wise man, if it be lawful to call 
him a man ; for he was a doer of wonderful works ; a teacher of such as 
receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the 
Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was the Christ. And when Pilate, 
at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him 
to the cross, those that loved him did not forsake him; for he appeared 
to them alive again on the third day, as the divine prophets had foretold 
these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him ; and the 
sect of Christians so named from him, are not extinct at this day." 

II. 

The second line of testimony is that of friends of Chris- 
tianity, in order to confirm the witness of the enemies relating 
to the historicity of the facts and statements contained in the 

*On genuineness of this paragraph, see Excursus A. 
v>Ant. B. xviii, c.3. $3. 



614 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

sacred books now under discussion. It will embrace three 

classes of patristic evidence; namely, ancient 

firmed by bishops, the Apostolic Fathers, or disciples of 

the apostles, and the Christian Apologists. 
8. Origen, born at Alexandria, A. D. 185, and wrote by 
or before 254. Eusebius, in his Ecclesiastical History, makes 
the following citation from Origen : 

a) "These are the books which he mentions. . . . He attests 
that he knows only four Gospels, . . . which are the only undisputed 
ones in the whole Church throughout the world. The first was written 
according to Matthew; the same who was once a publican, but after- 
ward an apostle of Jesus Christ, who having published it for the Jew- 
ish converts, wrote it in Hebrew. The second [Gospel] is according to 
Mark, who composed it as Peter explained it to him. And the third 
[Gospel] according to Luke, the Gospel commended by Paul, which was 
written for the converts of the Gentiles ; and, last of all, the Gospel ac- 
cording to John." 80 

ft) The question is critically asked : Why did not the sev- 
eral writers of the four Gospels add their signatures to their 
writings to substantiate their genuineness and authenticity? 
The sufficient answer is, that these points were substantiated 
in another and better way. Chrysostom, Bishop of Constan- 
tinople (347-407), says: 

" Moses did not put his name to the five books ; nor did the histo- 
rians who wrote after him, prefix their names to their writings ; but 
the blessed Paul everywhere prefixes his name to his Epistles, except- 
ing to that of the Hebrews, where he had reason to be on his reserve. 
What is the reason of this? They [the Evangelists] delivered their 
writings to those who were present, when it was needless to put down the 
name. He [Paul] sent his writings to those who were at a distance in 
the form of an Epistle, where the addition of a name is necessary." 81 

So direct and personal was this method of authenticating 
the apostolicity of these historical books of the New Testa- 
ment, that these documents were regarded as incontestable, 
and therefore were never held in dispute in the Church. 

y) Origen further mentions the three Epistles of John, two 

so Book vl, 25. toHom. on Rom. B. 9. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 615 

by Peter, the first of which was undisputed, but of the second 
Epistle there was some doubt ; also the Apocalypse, and the 
Epistle to the Hebrews. Of this last Epistle Origen says : 

" It differs from Paul's style ; is writtten in purer Greek ;" but "the 
ideas are admirable, and not inferior to any of the books acknowleged 
to be apostolic." " But I would say that the thoughts are the apostle's, 
but the diction and the phraseology belong to one who recorded what 
the apostle said, as one noted down what the Master dictated. But 
who it was that really wrote the Epistle, God only knows." 82 

8) Obviously, to be able to name the writer of a given 
document is so far satisfactory ; but it does not prove that the 
document is inspired of God, or even that its contents are 
authentic. Such claims rest upon more solid grounds than a 
writer's signature. There is, indeed, no warrant for believing 
that the apostles were acting under that supernatural inspira- 
tion known as theopneustia, in their daily life and conduct; 
hut merely when engaged in the work of their apostolateJ® 
Authorship, then, is one thing, and inspiration is another. 
For the foregoing reason, given by Chrysostom, Paul took 
special care to authenticate his own writings to the several 
Churches or the individual addressed. Some, if not all, his 
apostolic Epistles were circular letters ; a circumstance which 
necessitated the more attention respecting the authentic evi- 
dence of his apostolic authorship. He seems to have posited 
his autograph and "token" with the several Churches to 
which he wrote, in order to detect certain spurious letters circu- 
lated at that time, in the names of the apostles. Hence he 
wrote : 

" Paul an apostle . . . unto the Churches of Galatia." M And 
again : "When this Epistle is read among you, cause it to be read in the 
church of the Laodiceans ; and that ye likewise read the Epistle from 
Laodicea." ^ " The salutation of Paul with mine own hand, which is the 
token in every Epistle. So I write." m 

s« Eusebius, E. H., vi, c. 25. 83 g e e Acts xvl, 7, 9; xv, 37-39; Gal. ii, 11-13. 

MGal.i, 2. 85 col. iv, 16. 

s« 2 Thess, iii, 17, comp. 1 Cor. xvi, 21 ; Col. iv, 18; Gal. vi, 11. 



616 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

e) The Muratorian Canon, dating A. D. 170. This docu- 
ment of recent discovery gives a peculiarly 
Fourth interesting account of the origin of John's Gos- 
pel. Professor Brooke Foss Westcott, of Cam- 
bridge University, 87 England, makes the following statement 
respecting it : 

" The fragment commences with the last words of a sentence which 
evidently referred to the Gospel of St. Mark. The Gospel of St. Luke, 
it is then said, stands third in order [in the Canon], having been written 
by Luke the physician, the companion of St. Paul, who, not being him- 
self an eye-witness, based his narrative on such information as he could 
obtain, beginning from the birth of John. The fourth place is given to 
the Gospel of St. John, ' a disciple of the Lord/ and the occasion of its 
composition is thus described : 'At the entreaties of his fellow-disciples 
and his bishops, John said: Fast with me for three days from this time, 
and whatever shall be revealed to each of us [whether it be favorable to 
my writing or not] let us relate it to one another: On the same night 
it was revealed to Andrew, one of the apostles, that John should relate 
all things in his own name, aided by the revision of all. . . . What 
wonder is it, then, that John brings forward each detail with so much 
emphasis, even in his Epistles, saying of himself, What we have seen with 
our eyes, and heard with our ears, and our hands have handled, these things 
have we written to you. For so he professes that he was not only an eye- 
witness, but a hearer, and, moreover, an historian of all the wonderful 
works of the Lord in order/ " 

The assistance rendered to John by the other apostles, here 
referred to, serves to explain a single sentence which other- 
wise seems disconnected and inexplicable. It is at the close 
of the Gospel, and reads as the indorsement of the revision- 
ists should read, respecting the authenticity of John's Gospel ; 
namely, " This is that disciple who testifleth these things, and 
wrote these things; and we know that his testimony is 
true." ffl 

Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, who was the disciple of Poly- 
carp, who was the disciple of the Apostle John, wrote : " John 
the disciple of the Lord, the same that lay upon his bosom, 
also published the Gospel while he was yet at Ephesus in 
Asia." 89 

87 Canon of the New Testament, 5th ed., p. 214. 

88 John xxi, 24. 89 Euseb. E. H. v, c. 8, p. 176. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 617 

Clement of Alexandria, who wrote in the second century, 

is the authority for the tradition from the apostles : 

"John, the last of all [the Evangelists], perceiving that what had 
reference to the body of our Savior was sufficiently detailed [in the 
other three Gospels which he had read], and being encouraged by his 
familiar friends, and urged by the Spirit, wrote a spiritual Gospel." 90 

To which Eusebius himself adds: "But he [John] com- 
menced with the doctrine of the Divinity [of Christ] as the 
part reserved for him by the Divine Spirit, as for a su- 
perior." 91 

9. Tertullian, of Carthage, the learned jurisconsult and 

eminent defender of the faith, born A. D. 150, and flourished 

in the close of the second century, wrote : 

" The Gospel of Luke, which we are defending [against the heretic 
Marcion] with all our might, has stood its ground from its very first 
publication ;" " while that which Mark published may be affirmed to be 
Peter's, whose interpreter Mark was. For even Luke's form of the Gos- 
pel men usually ascribe to Paul. And it may well seem that the works 
which the disciples published, belong to their Masters/' " On the whole, 
then, if that is evidently the more true which is earlier ; if that is 
earlier which is from the beginning ; if that is from the beginning 
which has the apostles for its authors — then it will certainly be quite 
evident that that comes down from the apostles, which has been kept as 
a sacred deposit in the Churches of the apostles. Let us see what ' milk' 
the Corinthians drank from Paul ; to what rule of ' faith ' the Galatians 
were brought for correction ; what the Philippians, the Thessalonians, 
the Ephesians read by it; what utterances also the Eomans give who 
are nearest to us, to whom Peter and Paul conjointly bequeathed the 
Gospel, even sealed with their blood. We have also John's foster 
Churches [viz., the seven Churches of Asia]." 92 

An analysis of Tertullian's testimony written about one 
hundred and thirty-five years after the publication of the Gos- 
pels, yields the following facts : 

1. Even with heretics, Luke's Gospel had an undisputed credit 

from the beginning. 

2. Mark's Gospel was considered as the substance of Peter's 

preaching at Kome. 

3. The four Evangelists are correctly named; John is identi- 

fied with " the Churches in Asia." 

so Euseb. E. H. vi, 14. « lb. iii, 24. & Against Marcion, iv, 5. 



618 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

4. Six Pauline Epistles, as addressed to Churches, are here 

mentioned by Tertullian. 

5. He affirms that writings "from the beginning had the 

apostles for their authors." 

6. That these had been "kept as a sacred deposit in the 

Churches of the apostles.'.'* 

10. Irenaeus, born A. D. 115-125, was a Smyrnean, who 
was at but one remove from the instructions of the Apostle 
John. He became Bishop of Lyons in 178. He calls the 
books of the New Testament " the Sacred Scriptures" and "the 
Oracles of God." 93 Then he makes this attestation : 

" We have not received the knowledge of the way of salvation by any 
others than from those through whom the Gospel has come down to us ; 
which Gospel they first preached, and afterward, by the will of God, 
transmitted in writing, that it might be the foundation and pillar of our 
faith. . . . After our Lord had risen from the dead, and they were 
clothed with the power of the Holy Spirit, . . . they went forth to 
the ends of the earth, spreading the glad tidings of the blessings which 
God conferred on us, announcing peace from heaven to men, having 
all and every one alike the Gospel of God. 

" Matthew also issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their 
own dialect, while Peter and Paul were preaching at Eome, and laying 
the foundation of the Church. And after their departure [from earth], 
Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, did also hand down to us in 
writing what had been preached by Peter. Luke, also, the companion of 
Paul, recorded in a book, the Gospel preached by him. Afterwards John, 
the disciple of the Lord, who also leaned upon his breast, did himself 
publish a Gospel, during his residence in Asia." 94 " The Church, though 
dispersed throughout the earth, received from the apostles and their 

* Simon Greenleaf on the Law of Evidence, 15th ed., Vol. I, $ 142. 

" Documents found in a place in which, and under the care of persons with 
whom, such papers might naturally and reasonably be expected to be found, or in 
the possession of persons having an interest in them, are in precisely the custody 
which gives authenticity to documents found within it." 

Note.—" The rule stated in the text is one of the grounds on which we insist 
on the genuineness of the books of the Holy Scriptures. They are found in the 
proper custody or place, where alone they ought to be looked for; namely, the 
Church, where they have been kept from time immemorial. They have been con- 
stantly referred to as the foundation of faith by all the opposing sects, whose ex- 
istence God in his wisdom has seen fit to permit, whose jealous vigilance would 
readily detect any attempt to falsify the text, and whose diversity of creeds would 
render any mutual combination morally impossible." 

«3 Adv. Heresies, B. i, 8; ii, c. 27. 

9*Eusebius, Eccl. Hist. c. 8, p. 176; lren. adv. Heresies, B. ill, c. 1. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 619 

disciples this faith." 96 " The Gospel [itself] and all the elders witness, 
who in Asia conferred with John the Lord's disciple, to the effect that 
John delivered these things unto them ; for he abode until the times of 
Trajan [A. D. 98-117]. And some of them saw not only John, but others 
of the apostles also, and had this same account from them, and witness 
to the aforesaid account." M 

Clement of Alexandria gives a brief testimony respecting 
the origin of the Gospel by Mark. He says : 

" When Peter had proclaimed the word publicly at Kome, and de- 
clared the Gospel under the influence of the Spirit, as there was a great 
number present, they requested Mark, who had followed him from 
afar, and remembered well what he said, to reduce those things to writing; 
and that after composing the Gospel, he gave it to them who requested it of 
him. Which, when Peter understood, he directly neither hindered nor 
encouraged it." w 

The substance of these several testimonies is to this effect : 

that the Gospels were written by the apostles of Jesus ; that they 

were transmitted bv the writers to the Church 

J §412. a com- 

throughout the whole world ; that the Church re- parative 

ceiving them were the proper custodians of the 
Sacred Books; and that the witness of Celsus, the champion 
of disbelief, stands confirmed in his affirmation of the author- 
ship of the Gospels, by his Christian contemporaries in the 
middle of the second century ; namely, by Tertullian, Irenseus, 
and Clement of Alexandria, all of whom lived within eighty- 
five years of the publication of the Gospels. 

i. A comparative view of their testimonies is conclusive that 
written Gospels were historically existent, and in wide circula- 
tion, long before the middle of the second century. 

1. Irenseus testifies to the names of the four Evangelists as known 
as the writers of the four Gospels, who are mentioned in their proper 
order as we now have them. 

2. Irenseus affirms the first of the following propositions : 

a) That " Matthew issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their 
own dialect." Celsus says: "The disciples of Jesus wrote such accounts 
regarding him." 

96 Ant. Fathers, Iren. vs. Heresies, c. 10, B. i. 

96 See Bp. Lightfoot's Apos. Fathers on Iren. ii, 22. 5, Fragment iv, p. 554. 

97 « Hypotyposes," cited by Eusebius, Eccl. Hist,, B. vi, c. 14. 



620 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

j8) That " Mark handed down to us, in writing, what had been 
preached by Peter." Clement says: "Mark . . . reduced those 
things to ivriting; and after composing the Gospel, he gave it to those who 
had requested it of him." 

7) That ''Luke recorded in a book the Gospel preached by Paul." 
Tertullian says: "The Gospel of Luke has stood its ground from its 
very first publication." Celsus says that he could relate " things differ- 
ent from those written by the disciples of Jesus." 

5) That " John, the disciple of the Lord, who leaned upon his breast, 
did himself publish a Gospel, during his residence in Ephesus, in Asia." 
And Celsus, having cited from each Gospel, says: "All these things 
are taken from your own books, in addition to which we need no other 
witness." 

ii. The transmission, reception, and custody of the Sacred 

Books are thus substantiated with reference to the Church : 

3. Irenseus says: "Which Gospel they first preached, and after- 
wards transmitted in writing, that it might be the foundation and pillar 
of the Faith;" that " the Church, though dispersed throughout the 
earth, received from the apostles and their disciples, this faith." Clement 
says that " Mark, after composing the Gospel, gave it to them that re- 
quested it of him." Irenseus says specifically of John's Gospel: "The 
Gospel [itself] and all the elders witness who in Asia conferred with 
John, the Lord's disciple, to the effect that John had delivered these 
things unto them ; for he abode until the times of Trajan. And some 
of them saw not only John, but others of the apostles also, and had this 
same account from them ; and witness to the aforesaid account [of the cor- 
rectness of John's Gospel]." 

By another movement upward in chronology we have a 
witness who was born in the first century [A. D. 89], and was 
living before the Apostle John died, whose testimony is of 
paramount importance as respects the existence of the Gospel 
in written form, at that date. 

11. Justin, surnamed the Martyr, a philosopher, and the 
most eminent Greek Apologist of his century, a Samaritan by 
birth, born at Shechem, now called Nablous, in Central Pal- 
estine. He was remarkable for his memory, his wide reading, 
and great learning. An undisputed authority states that " he 
cites our present canon, and particularly our four Gospels con- 
tinually, . . . about two hundred times." m His references 

9 8 Jones, New and Full Method, i, 589. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 621 

to and citations from the Gospels alone number one hundred 
and twenty instances. In his First Apology he makes nearly 
fifty allusions and quotations from the New Testament, and 
in his Dialogue with Trypho he makes about seventy more. 

But that which is of special importance is that designation 
which he applies to the four Gospels referring to their author- 
ship, as The Memoirs of the Apostles, or in respect to their 
contents, Memoirs, and Memorabilia.™ In his Dialogue, he 
calls the Gospels Memoirs four times, and Memoirs of the 
Apostles ten times. A few instances are sufficient to illustrate 
the fact: 

1. "A Star arose in the heavens at the time of his birth, as is re- 
corded in the Memoirs of His Apostles.'' 100 

2. " They parted my garments and cast lots upon my vesture, . . . 
and this is recorded to have happened [unto Jesus] in the Memoirs of His 
Apostles." 101 

3. "As those having written Memoirs touching all things concerning 
our Savior Jesus Christ taught, whom we believe." 102 

4. "For the apostles in the Memoirs composed by them, which are called 
Gospels, have delivered unto us, what was enjoined upon them." 103 

5. "In the Memoirs, which I affirm were drawn up by his apostles, and 
those that accompanied them, that his sweat fell down like drops of blood, 
while he was praying." 104 

Professor Andrews Norton, in his famous work, says: 

"From the works of Justin might be extracted a brief account of 
the life and doctrine of Christ, corresponding with that contained in the 
Gospels, and corresponding to that degree, both in matter and words, 
that almost every quotation and reference may be readily assigned to its 
proper place, in one or the other of the Gospels." m 

Having made specific citations and repeated references to 
each of the four Gospels, Justin further alludes to and cites 
from Acts, Komans, the Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, 
Philippians, Colossians, Second Thessalonians, Hebrews, Sec- 
ond Epistle of Peter, and the Book of Kevelation. 



9« Td aironv7)fjL6vevfxa.Ta,= things worthy of remembrance. 
ioo Dialogue with Trypho, 106. 101 Dialogue, 104. i« First Apology, 83. 

10 3 1 b. 66. 104 Dialogue, 103. 

106 Genuineness of the Gospels, Vol. I, p. 127, 2d edition. 

40 



622 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

12. Papias, who seems to have been born in the first cen- 
tury, was Bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia, whom Irenaeus 
mentions as " a hearer of John [the apostle] and the associate 
of Polycarp." His only work was entitled, An Exposition of 
the Discourses of the Zord, m of which about fifteen fragments 
remain. Papias says : 

"Matthew composed his history in the Hebrew dialect, and every 
one translated it as he was able." "Mark being the interpreter of 
Peter [into the Greek], whatsoever he recorded he wrote with great 
accuracy, but not in the order in which it was spoken or done by our 
Lord ; for he never heard nor followed the Lord ; but ... he was in 
company with Peter who gave him such instruction as was necessary, 
but not to give a history of our Lord's discourses. Wherefore Mark has 
not erred in anything by writing some things as he has recorded them, 
for he was carefully attentive to one thing; [viz.,] not to pass by any- 
thing he heard, or to state anything falsely in these accounts." There 
are also other " testimonies from the First Epistle of John, and likewise 
that from Peter." 107 

Another upward movement of about seventy-five years 
brings us completely within the Apostolic Age, and to the tes- 
timony of two persons of distinction who were the converts 
and companions of the apostles themselves. They are known 
as the Apostolic Fathers; the Fathers who were the immediate 
pupils of the apostles. 

13. Clement of Rome, of whom Paul wrote to the Philip- 
pians: "Help those women who labored with me in the gospel, 
with Clement also, . . . whose names are in the Boole of 
Life." m Irenaeus wrote of Clement: "This man as he had 
seen the blessed apostles, and had been conversant with them, 
might be said to have the preaching of the apostles still echo- 
ing [in his soul] ." m 

Clement was Bishop of Rome A. D. 93-101. He wrote 
but one Epistle, which had for its object to compose a feud in 
the Church at Corinth. In this Epistle he cites the four Gos- 
pels, Acts, Romans, Corinthians, Ephesians, First Epistle of 

106 A.oyl(av KvpianQp 'e£?j7ei$-. 

107 Euseb. E. H., B. iii, c. 39, pp. 115, 116. See Bishop Lightfoot's Apos. Fath., p. 529. 

108 Phil, iv, 8. 109 Adv. Heresies, iii, c. 3, $3. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 623 

Timothy, Titus, Hebrews, First Epistle of Peter, the Epistle 
of James, and the Book of Revelation; making fourteen in 
all. There are no less than seventy-three references and cita- 
tions in this Epistle. Here is one reference : 

"Take in your hands the Epistle of the blessed Paul [to you Co- 
rinthians]. What wrote he unto you in the beginning of the Gospel? 
Of a truth he charged you in the Spirit concerning himself and Cephas 
and Apollos ; because even then ye had made parties," no etc. 

14. Barnabas (70-79). The common consensus of the latest 
critical scholarship refuses to identify this man with Barnabas 
the Apostle, a Levite of Cyprus, who was the companion of 
Paul in his missionary journey into Asia Minor. He seems to 
have been a layman, and his Epistle is general in object and 
character, in opposition to the Judaizing teachers of that pe- 
riod. The document was written in Greek and attached to 
the famous Greek manuscript of the New Testament found by 
Dr. Tischendorf in the convent of St. Catherine, at Mount 
Sinai, in 1859, and published in 1862. It is obvious from 
this Epistle that the three Synoptic Gospels, the Epistle to the 
Komans, the two to the Corinthians, Philippians, the Second 
to Timothy, and the Second of Peter, and the Apocalypse, 
were all in circulation at that time, which was within from 
five to fifteen years of the publication of the Gospels. The 
contents of this Epistle furnish three lines of evidence touching 
the point under discussion, namely : 

1. Conspicuous Facts and Occurrences mentioned in the Gospels. 

2. Quotations and References to the Substances of the Scriptures. 

3. A direct citation under the formula, "As it is written." 

Of the Facts and Occurrences, a few instances are given 
to illustrate the proposition : 

1. The mentioning of Jesus Christ by name. 111 

2. Choice, Number, and Authority of Christ's Apostles. 112 

3. Miracles wrought in Christ's Ministry. 113 

4. The peculiar Sufferings which he endured. 114 



«° Epis. c. 47. U1 Epis. of Barnabas, cc. 2, 7-9. 112 lb. cc. 5, 8 

H3 lb. 5. 11*76.5,7. 



624 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

5. The Spitting upon, and Smiting of his Person. 115 

6. The Mockery of Herod with the Scarlet Robe. 116 

7. The putting of Christ to death by Crucifixion. 117 

8. Giving him Vinegar and Gall tc drink. 118 

9. The Casting of Lots for his Garments before the Cross. 119 

10. His Resurrection on the Third Day. 120 

11. Its Celebration on the Eighth Day. 121 

12. The Ascension of Jesus into Heaven. 122 

A few illustrations of the References and Quotations of 
Scripture must answer : 

"Thou shalt not hesitate to give." 123 "He came not to call the 
righteous, but sinners." 124 "The Son of God being Lord, and future 
Judge of the quick and dead." 125 "By receiving the remission of our 
sins . . . we are become new, created afresh from the beginning." ia6 
" The glory of Jesus, how that in him, and unto him are all things." 127 
" He himself endured that he might destroy death." 128 " The day of the 
Lord shall be as a thousand years." 129 

Barnabas quotes the words of Jesus occurring in the first 
Gospel, under the formula "As it hath been written" "For 
many are called, but few chosen." 130 These words of Jesus 
appear in Matthew's Gospel, and nowhere else in Scripture. 131 
The Epistle of Barnabas reads : " Let us take heed, lest haply 
we be found, as it hath been written. 132 Many are called, but 
few chosen" The words in the original of the Epistle of 
Barnabas and of the Greek Testament are the same, 133 as 
they are also in the English. The Latin version is ambiguous 
when taken by itself; 134 while in the Greek the expression is 
entirely clear and determinate. 

The argument in which all these details converge is the 
conclusive one that the Church from the hands of the apostles 
has always been in possession of the apostolic Scriptures. It 
was not a mere oral or traditional Gospel whose teachings 



us Epis.of Barnabas, 5, 7. ™Ib. 7. "7 76.7. wib.7. "»J6.6. 

ia) lb. 5, 15. "i lb. 15. 122 lb. 15. ™ lb. 19 ; Matt, v, 42. »« lb. 5 ; Mark 11, 17. 

125 lb. 7 ; Acts x, 42. u« lb. 16 ; 2 Cor. v, 17. "» lb. 12 ; Rom. xi, 36. 

128 lb. 5; 1 Cor. xv, 26. i» lb. 15; 2 Pet. Ill, 8. »» lb. 4, close. 

131 Matt, xx, 16; xxil, 14, in A. V. 132 'ftr yiypairrai. 

133 IIo\\ot kKtjtoL 6X1701, 5t ixXeKTol w* Sicum scriptum est. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 625 

governed the life of the primitive Christians, but they held in 
their hands and studied the written books of the New Testament. 
On such evidence, it is obviously irrational to hold that these 
Sacred Books did not have an historical existence during the 
first three hundred years of the Christian era, and that the 
contents of the books were not historical. For it is irrational 
to maintain on any historical grounds or questions, that so 
many different writers could state so many circumstances as are 
recorded in these Scriptures, when no such facts ever occurred, 
and no such Scriptures then existed. It is irrational to believe 
that so many adversaries could name so many apostolic writers, 
could describe so many apostolic acts, and would ascribe the ac- 
counts of these acts to certain sacred books, but the books did 
not exist until long afterwards. It is as irrational as it is 
absurd to believe that the enemies of Christianity do not con- 
firm and authenticate these Scriptures, when constantly refer- 
ring to these writings they make the distinct affirmation : "All 
these statements are taken from your own books" "as you your- 
selves have recorded" them. And it is as irrational as it is in- 
credible to hold that the apostolic authors did not write these 
books ascribed to them, when, without a single exception, 
friends and foes unanimously voice the first four centuries with 
the imputation and declaration that they did ! The evidence 
adduced substantiates beyond recall the historicity of the 
Scriptures of the New Testament ; for the catena of proofs is 
complete respecting the authorship, as well as the antiquity 
and authenticity of these Scriptures. 

It is the wise and forcible remark of the scholarly and 
critical Dr. Ezra Abbot which is indorsed by Professor Norton 
respecting the Christian witnesses here adduced, that — 

" It is not [merely] the testimony of a few eminent Christian writers 
to their private opinion, but it is the evidence they afford of the belief 
of the whole body of Christians; and this not in respect to ordinary books, 
whose titles they might easily take on trust, but respecting books in 
which they were most deeply interested ; books which were the very 
foundation of that faith which had separated them from the world 



626 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

around them, exposed them to hatred, scorn, and persecution, and often 
demanded the sacrifice of life itself." 135 

That which is of paramount importance in this argument is 

the admissions and claims made by the adversaries of the 

• Christian religion in respect to the fundamental 

of the facts respecting the life, death, and the work of the 
historical Christ. On these very facts rest the 
whole system of Christianity. Next in evidential value is the 
distinct implication, or assertion, that the disciples of Jesus 
wrote the books of the New Testament which they constantly 
cite, or to whose contents they refer. An added fact is, that 
their testimony mentions correctly by name ^Ye of the seven 
or eight writers of these Scriptures, and designates what they 
wrote. This voluntary witness of those adverse to Christianity 
stands absolutely confirmed on the main facts and many 
minor circumstances, by the testimony of the Christian Fath- 
ers. These writers are not merely a few isolated individuals 
who stand along the centuries apart from the communities in 
which they lived, but men of highest character among their 
contemporaries, voicing the universal judgment of the Church 
as it has been from the beginning. Here are mentioned cities 
unto whose people these Epistles were addressed, the names of 
the apostles who were the writers of these Epistles, and the 
different Churches which were made the depositories of these 
Epistles. By the rules of evidence applying alike to historical 
documents, whether secular or sacred in character, these apos- 
tolic books were kept in the proper custody to insure their 
authenticity. 

III. 

Destructive critics have laid great stress upon the titles 
which are prefixed to the several historical books 

§414. Some r 

collateral of the New Testament. It has even been sug- 

Evidence. g es ^ e( j that ^he Christian faith originated in, and 

was formulated by, the titles superscribed, as the exclusive evi- 

1 35 Authorship of the Fourth Gospel, first edition, p. 14. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 627 

dence of credibility. Dr. David Strauss went so far as to 
insist, that " the alleged ocular testimony is sheer assumption, 
originating from the titles which the Biblical books bear in the 
Canon." 136 But, in turn, this is sheer assumption, andjdestitute 
of proof. It is a well-ascertained fact, however, that these 
titles are very ancient, as they are found on some of the earliest 
Greek manuscripts extant. But it does not appear that they 
were placed by the apostolic authors upon the original auto- 
graphs. Nor is it known when or by whom these superscrip- 
tions were prefixed, but they clearly antedate the great 
Councils of the Church. It is, however, most natural to suppose 
that they were originally placed upon these documents by 
those receiving them, to whom they came authenticated, in 
order to distinguish one book from another. Some special 
minute was necessitated to preserve the authenticated author- 
ships from running into confusion. Tertullian censures Mar- 
ion' s mutilated Gospel for the omission of its title, insisting 
that "A work ought not to be recognized . . . which gives 
no promise of credibility from the fullness of the title" 131 
Several different versions which are among the earliest, and 
long antedate the most ancient Greek manuscripts, have dis- 
tinguishing titles of the First Gospel. Thus the Syriao has : 
" The Gospel, the Preaching of Matthew." In the Persian it 
reads: " The Gospel of Matthew which was spoken in the 
Hebrew tongue in the City of Palestine, but written in Syriac." 
In the Arabic : " The Gospel of Saint Matthew which he vjrote 
in Hebrew, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit." m 

Next to the peculiar age-coloring of an ancient document, 
one of the most reliable proofs of its antiquity and authenticity 
is the use made of it in citations, made by contem- 

' J §415. Citations 

poraries and their successors, especially when the as 

authorship is accredited. As they know their 

authority, this is decisive against the spuriousness of the writ- 

186 Leben Jesu, § 13. 

137 Tertull. adv. Marcion, Iv, c. 2. 

138 Home's Introduction, American Edition, Vol. I, 215; II, 295, 296. 



628 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ing; and they could not quote from writers who lived after 

themselves. In all respects, the books of the New Testament 

have the advantage of incomparable superiority over all classic 

writers known. Dr. Lardner, who was a famous investigator 

on all lines respecting the books of the New Testament, says : 

" We have seen and examined a large number of works of learned 
Christian writers in Palestine, Syria, the countries of Asia Minor, Egypt, 
and that part of Africa that used the Latin tongue, and in Crete, Greece, 
Italy and Gaul ; all [written] in the space of about one hundred and fifty 
years after the writing of the first book of the New Testament. In the re- 
maining works of Irenseus, Clement of Alexandria, and Tertullian . . . 
there are perhaps more and larger quotations of the New Testament than 
of all the works of Cicero." " The facts upon which the Christian religion is 
founded, have made a stronger proof than any facts at such a distance of 
time; and the books which convey them down to us may be proved to be uncor- 
rupted and authentic, with greater strength than any other writings of 
equal antiquity." 139 

Mr. Rawlinson, in his Bampton Lectures, already cited, 
makes some very pertinent remarks on the point of quotations 
and their authenticating force, in a comparison of these Scrip- 
tures and the writings of classical authors. He says : 

" Before the titles were attached, the belief must have existed [in 
their authenticity]. In truth, there is not the slightest pretense for insinu- 
ating that there ever was any doubt as to the authorship of any one of the 
historical books of the New Testament, which are as uniformly ascribed to 
the writers whose names they bear, as the 'Return of the Ten Thousand' 
[ascribed] to Xenophon, or the 'Lives of the Cxsars' to Suetonius. There 
is, indeed, far better evidence of authorship in the case of the four Gospels 
and Acts of the Apostles than exists with respect to the works of almost 
any classic author. It is of very rare occurrence for classic works to be 
distinctly quoted, or for authors to be mentioned by name, within a cen- 
tury of their publication. The Gospels . . . are frequently quoted 
within this period, and the writers of three at least out of the four are 
mentioned within the time, as authors of the works correspondingly per- 
fect to those which have come down to us as their compositions. Our 
conviction of the genuineness of the Gospels does not rest exclusively, nor even 
mainly, on the titles, but on the unanimous consent of ancient writers, and of 
the whole Christian Church in the first ages." 140 

Test the matter by a few instances of conspicuous character. 
Herodotus, who lived B. C. 484-408, and has been called "the 

™Lardner's Works, Vol. V, 197, 198. "° Led. vi, p. 159. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 629 

Father of Greek History " in the classic world, is said to have 
been cited by Ctesias only once in the first century ; and in the 
second century by Aristotle alone ; and in the third century by 
no writer whatever ; and in the fourth, by Chius and by Cicero. 
Thucydides (B. C. 470-403), the greatest Greek historian, is 
first quoted by Hermippus, about two centuries after the publi- 
cation of his work. Tacitus, the greatest of Roman historians, 
who wrote about A. D. 110, is mentioned once by his personal 
friend Pliny the younger in a mere friendly and incidental 
way, but he is not quoted or referred to in any writings until 
the close of the second century, by Tertullian. 
Professor John J. Given, of London, says : 

" Every one acquainted with the matter will agree with us when we 
affirm that there is ten times stronger and more satisfactory evidence for the 
genuineness and substantial integrity of the books of the Scriptures than for 
the History of Tacitus and Thucydides, of Livy and Xenophon, about which 
no scholar ever entertains a doubt. If beginning with the present century 
we trace the writings of the New Testament, for example, backwards 
and upwards along the stream of time to the very source, we shall find 
them accredited by each foregoing generation and by men of each pre- 
ceding century, till we reach the days of primitive Christianity itself, 
when we find them universally believed by early Christians to be the 
works of their eight reputed authors, and quoted as such by the earliest 
Christian writers and contemporaries and successors of the primitive 
penmen. Add to this the testimony of neutrals, apostates, heretics, foes 
as well as friends of Christianity. What more conclusive proof of author- 
ship can reasonable criticism demand, or the archives of human literature 
produce, than this combined and concurrent testimony of the genuineness of 
the Sacred Scriptures f " 141 

That we have not now any Greek copies of the New Testa- 
ment of earlier date than 325 A. D. by no means necessitates 
the conclusion that none existed previously ; for, § 416 . citations 
as will be seen, these Scriptures were constantly b y tne 
appealed to and cited by the Fathers of the 
Church. An incident gives point and illustration to this fact. 
In the course of conversation which occurred in London between 
Dr. Buchanan and Lord Hales, a curious but most interesting 
question was proposed: "If every copy of the New Testament 

141 Revelation, Inspiration, and Canon, 210-212. 



630 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

had been destroyed [under the Diocletian-Maximian persecu- 
tion] at the end of the third century, could it be recovered 
from extracts made from it in the works of the Fathers of the 
second and third centuries ? " Alter a short lapse of time these 
personages met again, when the subject was renewed by 
Lord Hales saying: "As I possess all the extant Fathers of the 
second and third century, I commenced the search ; and up to 
the present time, I have found the entire New Testament, all 
hut eleven verses!" 1 ® How could the Fathers of the second 
and third centuries have made their numerous and copious 
citations from these Scriptures unless they were then and pre- 
viously in existence ? 

In bringing to a close the argument for the antiquity, 
authenticity, and the historicity of the New Testament, it is 
proper to remark that the enemies of Christianity affirm the 
cardinal facts narrated in these books, naming nearly all of the 
authors, and refer to their writings, which they evidently had 
in their possession in the second and third century. The wit- 
ness of friends confirms the testimony of the enemies, carrying 
upward the citations from the same and other books, naming 
the same writers, through the same centuries, to the very times 
of the apostles themselves. The internal evidence of the gen- 
uineness and historicity of the several books furnished by their 
ancient titles as well as the signatures of apostolic authority 
in all the Epistles; the lack of signatures to the historical 
books explained by Chrysostom as due to their personal de- 
liverance directly to those to whom they were immediately 
addressed; with the added evidence of nearly ten thousand 
references and citations from these Scriptures, m,ade therefrom 
in less than two centuries after they were written and pub- 
lished, — constitute a combination of proofs which can not be 
adduced in favor of the authorship, antiquity, and historicity 
of any other booh, or set of boohs, in the whole literary world. 

i&New Companion of the Bible, cited by Professor Given in his Canon, p. 361. 



Verification of the New Testament as Historical. 631 

A further proof on this subject is needless. The induc- 
tions on the facts adduced are inevitable. According to the 
Rule of Evidence, cited from Greenleaf as the highest author- 
ity for the practice of the courts on all historical questions, 
the sacred books have always been in the proper custody, 
being in the possession of the Church. The contents of the 
earliest Greek manuscripts, and of the still earlier versions in 
other languages, attest the identity of the facts and doctrines 
with the Scriptures which we now possess. Their antiquity and 
historicity are therefore established. It only remains to pre- 
sent a Tabulated Exhibit of references to, and quotations from, 
all the books of the New Testament, made by two eminent 
Fathers in the Church, and by two of the greatest Apologists 
who defended the Christian faith and people before the Ko- 
man Government. These citations of Scripture were made at 
different dates, according to the time when the different 
writers wrote, the remotest being within one hundred and 
eighty-five years after the publication of most of the boohs of 
the New Testament, and within about one hundred and fifty 
years of the time that the writings of John the apostle appeared, 
and were received by the Church. 

The words of Professor Given are here in place, respecting 
the antiquity and authenticity of these sacred writings as a 
whole : 

" No one can pretend to gainsay the fact that they have been estab- 
lished on a hundred-fold more historical basis than of those literary 
productions of classical antiquity which nobody ever thinks of calling in 
question." 143 

The great uncial manuscripts of the New Testament date 
about from 325 down to the sixth century; but Versions and 
text can be traced back to the second century. There is no 
known manuscript of Herodotus or of Thucydides dating 
earlier than the tenth, or of Xenophon earlier than the eleventh 
to the thirteenth century. There is no reference in literature 



i« Professor Given on N. T. Canon, p. 212. 



632 



Historical, Evidence of the New Testament. 



to Thucydides for two centuries after his death. Nor can any 
Latin History hear the test which is applied to the books of the 
New Testament. The first six books of Tacitus's Annals 
depend on only one MS., dating not earlier than the ninth cen- 
tury. (See Watkin's Bamjpton Lectures, 1890, p. 138, note.) 
The following exhibit is compiled from Keith's Demon- 
stration of the Truth of Christianity, and Mair's Christian 
Evidences. The figures given are approximate, if not exact. 

§417. The Citations Made Between 65-248 A. D. 





Irenseus. 


Clement 
of Alex- 
andria. 


Ter- 
tullian. 


Origen. 


Total 


Grand 
Total. 


Years after the Publica- 
tion of the New Testa- 
ment 


115 

180 

15 

125 

80 

50 

60 

70 

17 

22 

27 

10 

10 

2 

8 

5 

5 

2 



9 

3 

5 



6 

3 





33 


150 

180 

20 

110 

60 

20 

110 

150 

30 

14 

15 

11 

8 

4 

1 

11 

5 

2 



11 



8 



6 







2 


150 

400 

80 

500 

240 

110 

160 

350 

120 

67 

64 

31 

24 

24 

18 

33 

18 

5 



12 

2 

12 



39 



2 



80 


185 

1352 

185 

649 

775 

147 

731 

620 

238 

150 

135 

68 

91 

48 

26 

92 

55 

18 

3 

154 

20 

50 

5 

77 





6 

60 


2112 

300 

1384 

1155 

327 

1061 

1190 

405 

253 

241 

120 

133 

78 

53 

141 

83 

27 

3 

186 

25 

75 

5 

128 

3 

2 

6 

175 




Matthew 




Mark 




Luke 




John 




Acts 


5278 


Romans 




1 Corinthians 




2 Corinthians 




Galatians 




Ephesians 




Philippians 




Colossians 




1 Thessalonians 




2 Thessalonians 




1 Timothy 




2 Timothy 




Titus 

Philemon 


3788 


Hebrews 




James 




1 Peter 




2 Peter 

1 John 




2 John 




3 John 




Jude 




Revelation 


605 








747 


778 


2391 


5749 


9671 


9671 



CHAPTER XX. 

MANUSCRIPTS— VERSIONS— CANON. 

I. Greek Manuscripts op the New Testament. 

1. The Codex Alexandrinus. 

2. The Codex Yaticanus. 

3. The Codex Sinaiticus. 

4. The Codex Rossanensis. 

II. Versions from the Greek in Other Languages. 

1. The Old Latin Version : 

a) The Vulgate of Jerome. 

2. The Syriac Versions : 

a) The Peshito Version. 
/S) The Cureton Version. 
7) The Harklein Version. 
5) A Syrian Gospel, 1895. 

3. The Egyptian Versions : 

a) The Memphitic Version. 
/S) The Thebaic Version. 
7) The Bushmuric Version. 

III. Canon of the New Testament. 

1. The Councils and the Canon. 

2. The Historical Canon. 

a) Synod of Laodicea. 

|8) Catalogues of the New Testament. 

7) Council of Trent. 

5) How our Canon was Established. 

The Conclusion. 



Chapter XX. 
MANTJSCKIPTS — VERSIONS — C ANOK 

§418. Manuscripts— Versions— Canon. 

Ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered to 
the saints. — Jude. 

In regard to the great Book, I have only to say that it is the best gift 
which God has given to man. — Abraham Lincoln. 

No book contains more truths, or is worthy of more confidence, than the 
Bible ; for none brings more comfort to the sorrowing, more 
strength to the weak, or more stimulus to the nobly ambitious ; 
none makes life sweeter, or death easier or less sad. — Justice 
David J. Brewer. 

Every fair-minded, unbiased person who will carefully read the Bible, 
with the desire to master its contents, will find abundant evidence 
of its Divine origin, and that it was designed to teach our duty to 
God and our fellow-men. — Chief Justice Maxwell, Neb. 

Hold fast the Bible as the sheet-anchor of your liberties ; write its pre- 
cepts upon your hearts, and practice them in your lives. — Ulysses 
S. Grant. 

I have always had, and shall always have, a profound regard for Chris- 
tianity. — Henry Clay. 

I own that I never read the New Testament with attention. — David Hume. 

Your Age of Reason may prevail with some readers, [yet] you will not 
succeed as to change the general sentiments of mankind on the 
subject ; and the consequence of printing your piece will be a 
great deal of odium drawn upon yourself ; mischief to you, and no 
benefit to others. "He that spits against the wind, spits in his 
own face." — Benjamin Franklin to Thomas Paine. 

My hatred and horror of infidelity are greater than ever. I know it to 
be the extreme of madness and misery, the utter degradation and 
ruin of a man's soul. — Joseph Barker. (A converted skeptic.) 

Bring with thee the books, especially the parchments. — Paul. 

Yes, I might almost say to the Lord, 
Here is a copy of Thy Word, 
Written out with much toil and pain: 
Take it, Lord, and let it be, 
As something I have done for thee. — Longfellow. 
635 



636 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



ARGUMENT. 

To give completeness to the whole historical argument of this treatise, 
a brief account of the circumstances which gave origin to the 
books of the New Testament, and our warrant now for their cred- 
ibility, is superadded. The modern foundation for Christian belief 
in these Sacred Books is threefold, — ancient Greek manuscripts, 
versions in other languages, and the history of the Sacred Canon. 
It is proposed to refute the unhistorical pretense which has gained 
some credence, that an early Ecclesiastical Council assumed the 
authority to determine, by a capricious majority, what books 
should be voted into the Canon, and what others of equal claims 
should be rejected. When and how these Scriptures received 
their canonicity, will appear in the discussion ; but it was centu- 
ries before any Council was convened. 

Three classes of literature arose in the middle of the second 
century, from which the writings of the New Testament are to be 
discriminated: (1) Those in which certain Scriptures had been 
corrupted and mutilated by the heretics so as to suit their precon- 
ceived notions of what they should teach: (2) Those which were 
mere romances, purporting to give the life of Jesus, containing 
shreds of history, but, on the whole, spurious as they were puerile ; 
and (3) Others which were issued as apostolic writings, but were 
fraudulent in fact, and bore the forged names of the apostles to 
give them authority. The Church of Christ took public measures 
of a decided character to protect itself from these impostures. 

The Manuscripts of the New Testament. 

The New Testament was not originally written and pub- 
lished as one volume as we now have it, but was composed of 
no less than twenty-seven distinct writings. It 

§419. The New J ° 

Testament was not all written by one man, but it is the 
product of eight writers, who wrote from differ- 
ent countries, at different dates within about thirty-five years. 
Each separate document, however, had its own distinctive 
occasion and purpose, its individual function and scope ; so 
that, when they were brought into one, an extraordinary inter- 
relation was discovered, in which the teachings of the docu- 
ments were found to be supplemental to, and confirmatory of, 
each other, and the whole evidenced a deep internal unity of 
design, bearing the characteristics of a progressive revelation 
from God. 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 637 

No book in all the history of literature has exerted so 
powerful an influence upon human conduct and individual 
character and life; none ever so endeared itself to the heart 
of all classes and conditions of mankind. To the teachings of 
this volume the foremost nations of the earth bow with rev- 
erent homage, and profess to be guided in a large measure by 
its principles and spirit. Those civilizations which are ac- 
knowledged to hold the most masterful place in the family of 
nations, to be most advanced in science and literature, in 
learning and culture, in commerce and influence, — the most 
powerful in war, the most prosperous in peace, and invincible 
before all enemies, — are the Christian nations called the Great 
Powers of the world, who attribute their pre-eminence to the 
accepted truth and principles taught in these Scriptures. 

It may be worth while to remark the external circum- 
stances in which the New Testament was originally written. 
The art of ancient book-making" is in this matter ajtn u 

& §420. The 

something more than interesting. We have not Ancient 

.-. .... ■ . , -. . , Book-making. 

m our possession those original manuscripts which 
are called the Autographic Documents of the Apostles, but we 
do have the early Greek copies, which date about A. D. 325. 
Why there are none known of earlier possession will be ex- 
plained hereafter. 

The materials upon which the ancients wrote in the time 
of the apostles were either papyrus or parchment. Papyrus 
was made of the inner cellular tissues of the papyrus plant, 
a reed which grows in abundance in the Delta district, in the 
valley of the Mle, in Egypt. Thin strips were laid together 
in layers, the one placed horizontally and another vertically, 
and made to hold by means of a glutinous substance under 
great pressure. 1 The product was naturally delicate and perish- 
able. Accordingly, papyrus was early superseded by the use 
of animal skins carefully prepared for the manufacture of 
manuscript books. Parchment was, indeed, a beautiful product 

1 Wilken Breslas, George Ebers, and Sir Mamede Thompson. 
41 



638 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

of both sheep and goat skins. As evidencing the use of parch- 
ment in the apostolic times, Paul wrote to Timothy to bring 
with him to Rome the cloak which he had left at Troas, " and 
the books, especially the parchments." 2 It was about the third 
century when the skins of calves and young antelopes were 
converted into vellum, which largely superseded the poorer 
and cheaper materials used previously; but by the ninth 
century the art of its manufacture had deteriorated to such an 
extent that it was replaced by a coarse and common paper 
made of cotton rags. This was again superseded by a fine 
quality of paper made of linen. It was of fine and elegant 
texture quite resembling the earlier vellum, whose use con- 
tinued until the art of printing was invented in the middle of 
the sixteenth century. The evidential value of these facts con- 
sists in the index which they furnish for determining the date 
of any given manuscript. 

The writers of the early Christian centuries were called 
scribes, whose industry was that of copyists, which was re- 
garded as a worthy and dignified work. There 

Ancient were two classes of scribes : the one called Tachy- 
graphers, meaning swift-writers, who wrote rapidly 
in shorthand what authors dictated; the other class called 
Calligraphers, or Beautiful writers, who copied the shorthand 
reports in a large and elegant form resembling our copper- 
plate. Paul, who was by far the most extensive writer of the 
New Testament, employed amanuenses to do his writing. One 
Tertius, a Christian copyist, is especially mentioned as uniting 
with the apostle in Christian salutation to the Roman brethren : 
" I Tertius, who wrote this epistle, salute you in the Lord." 3 

It is related that Origen employed many transcribers, and 
his friend Alexander, Bishop of Jerusalem, founded one of the 
earliest libraries of ecclesiastical manuscripts at Caesarea-on- 
the-Sea, to which Eusebius had free access in writing his 
historical works. It is stated that, upon the accession of Con- 



2 2 Tim. iv, 13. 8 Rom. xvi, 22. 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 639 

stantine to the throne of the empire at Constantinople, he 
issued an imperial edict to Eusebius to prepare fifty imperial 
copies of the New Testament entire, to be written by the very 
best copyists, on the finest vellum, in the form of rolls, subject to 
imperial examination. The work was accomplished in the 
library of Alexander, from the transcriptions of Origen. These 
volumes, when completed, were transported in two wagons of 
the government from Cassarea to Constantinople, whereupon 
the emperor examined and distributed the manuscripts to be 
kept in the custody of the several Churches for future use and 
careful preservation. The great critics, Tregelles, and Bleek, 
and others, entertained the belief that these very books are 
now in possession of the Biblical scholars and in the libraries 
of Europe. 4 

The sacred manuscripts are of two general classes, belonging 
to two different periods, and are easily distinguished by their 
chirography. The older class of writings were 
designated Uncials? because written originally, classes of 

t . -, , , , l-i >i Manuscripts, 

as supposed, in letters about an inch in length. 
The text appears without a break in the lines, or space between 
words, or any mark of punctuation. Whenever occasion served , 
a word was divided at the end of a line, but without regard to 
the syllables. However, there were certain indications of para- 
graphs or divisions of the text. The four Gospels were marked 
by irregular sections, and in the later copies these are found 
also in Acts and the Epistles. Ammonius of Alexandria 
marked off certain parallel passages in the four Gospels in 
order to harmonize them; and after him, Eusebius modified 
these by making ten tables called " Canons." In manuscripts 
of the fifth century, certain titles* were given sections as head- 
ings, designated by a given number. Matthew had sixty-eight 
titles, Mark had forty-eight, Luke eighty-three, and John 
eighteen. At a later period these marks are found also upon 
Acts and the Epistles. 

4 Merrill's Story of the Manuscripts, p. 28. 5 From Uncia, an inch. 

T/tXoi, titles, superscriptions. 



640 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Another class of manuscripts far more numerous are called 
Cursives because written in a running hand, on parchment or 
vellum, and also on cotton and liuen paper. The cursives are 
characterized by certain dots placed over the lines, by spaces 
between the words and sentences, and by an irregular system 
of punctuation, indicating an advance upon the older style of 
writing. This class began with the tenth century. Many of the 
cursive class are wrought with the greatest painstaking, and 
have the quality of elegance. The vellum used was often of 
very delicate finish, sometimes dyed with richest coloring, the 
text being written in bold and beautiful characters, in colored 
inks or in silver, and brilliantly illuminated by hand. When 
a manuscript has been once written and erased, and used again, 
it is called & palimpsest? The ink, having been made of vege- 
table substance, was easily obliterated; and a given vellum 
having been once written over, the writing was rubbed off to 
make place for a second and even a third text to be inscribed. 
By means of a chemical process discovered by Dr. Tischendorf , 
all the erased writings are recoverable and the desired text 
restored. 

The Uncial manuscripts of the New Testament, according 

to Scrivener, 8 number about ninety-seven ; and of the cursives, 

about one thousand, nine hundred and ninetv- 

§423. Distribu- ' J 

tion of seven. Occasionally, in order to obtain a corn- 
Manuscripts. -,, _£,-, O'X X.' J.' • 

plete copy ot these Scriptures, a combination is 
made of the several parts or fragments, which are made to 
supplement each other; but the parts are of different chro- 
nology, and therefore of unequal antiquity and value for 
critical purposes. All the manuscripts of the New Testament 
now known are in the form of books, several volumes of which 
embrace these Scriptures. These manuscript-books are pre- 
pared in the form of a folio, a quarto, or a duodecimo. They 
are distributed, mostly in the libraries of European countries, 
as follows: Sweden has one copy; Ireland has three; Den- 

7 ^tjv (\f/d(a) , to rub away, and -rrdXiv, again * Introd. 3d ed. 1883. 



Mantjsckipts — Versions — Canon. 641 

mark, three; Holland, six; Scotland, seven; Switzerland, 
fourteen; Spain, nineteen; Russia, over seventy ; Germany 
and Austria, ninety ; England, two hundred and fifty ; Italy, 
three hundred and twenty. So by cities: Pesth has two; 
Treves, two; Modena, six; Hamburg, six; Naples, nine; Cam- 
bridge, nineteen; Turin, twenty; Munich, twenty-seven; Vi- 
enna, twenty-eight; Yenice, fifty; Florence, fifty ; Oxford, one 
hundred and twenty-five ; Rome, one hundred and twelve, of 
which more than a hundred are in the library of the Yatican ; 
Paris has two hundred and twenty-eight, which are in the Im- 
perial Library, besides ten placed elsewhere in France. 

Only one uncial book contains the entire New Testament 
complete in itself, although thirty of all kinds have substan- 
tially all these sacred writings. The Gospels 
are more numerous than the Epistles. Of the mentary 
sixt} r -three uncials of all kinds, fifty-seven are of anuscn P s 
the Gospels. Dr. Scrivener gives six hundred and twenty- 
three cursives of the Gospels, while Acts and the General 
Epistles have fourteen uncials and two hundred and thirty -two 
cursives. Paul's Epistles are written in fifteen uncials, and in 
two hundred and eighty-three cursives. The Book of Revela- 
tion is written in five uncials, and one hundred and five cur- 
sives. Many of these manuscript books are stained with age, 
the vellum being fragile and worm-eaten. The following co- 
dices are regarded as most valuable critically, namely : 

1. The Alexandrine Codex. 

This codex was brought from Egypt in 1628 by Cyril 
Lucar, Patriarch of Constantinople, and presented in person to 
Charles I, and is now in possession of the British 

' r §425. ItsHis- 

Museum. Dr. Scrivener assigns this interesting tory and 
document to the beginning, but Dr. Davidson to ascription, 
the middle, of the fifth century. An autograph note from the 
patriarch named accompanied the codex, certifying that the 
Egyptian tradition refers the copying of the document to the 



642 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

martyred and sainted Thecla, about thirteen hundred years 
previously ; and this corresponds with an Arabic note on the 
first page, attesting the same fact. This would place the date 
in the early part of the fourth century, and it is doubted on 
just grounds. 

The Alexandrine Codex was the best known and most 
studied by the scholars of the past. It consists of Jour books, 
one of which contains the New Testament. At the beginning 
of the several books the first line is written in vermilion. The 
text is in uncial characters, marked with Ammonian sections, 
bearing " titles " as heads ; but there are no spaces between 
words, no accents or breathing signs at the aspirates in this 
Greek. The paragraphs are made conspicuous with initial 
letters, and a new line marks the divisions. Each page has 
two columns ; each column has fifty lines, with about twenty 
letters to the line. The manuscript evidences many erasures 
and abbreviations ; and there are grave defects in the document. 
It begins with Matthew xxv, 6, and omits John vi, 50, to viii, 
52 ; and 2 Cor. iv, 13, to xii, 6. 

2. The Vatican Codex. 

This codex ranks at least among the best transcripts of the 

New Testament. It is supposed to be nearly two hundred 

8 426. its years older than the Alexandrine. It was found 

History. by Pope Nicholas Y, a great scholar in his age, 
in the year 1448. It was long kept concealed in the Vatican 
at Rome by the successive popes ; and although it was twice 
captured by Napoleon I, and carried away to Paris, after his 
defeat at Waterloo in 1815, with other treasures, it was re- 
stored by the allied powers to Italy. When this occurred, 
Tregelles was but three years old, learning his vernacular in 
England, and Tischendorf was yet a child of two in his mother's 
arms at Legenf eld, in G-ermany. 

In form it is in red morocco quarto, ten and a half inches in 
length, and ten inches broad, and about five inches thick, con- 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 643 

taming seven hundred and fifty-nine thin leaves of vellum, of 
which one hundred and forty-six contain the New § 42 7. its 
Testament. It is written in uncial character, Description. 
three columns to the page. There are no divisions except the 
spaces made by the omission of letters, as at the beginning of 
a new subject; and there are no punctuation marks. Dr. 
Tischendorf dated this document in the fourth century, and 
Dr. Tregelles assigned it to the end of the first quarter of that 
century. 

3. The Sinaitic Codex. 

This manuscript is one of the most ancient and valued of 
the whole collection. In the first instance, Dr. Tischendorf 
in the vear 1844, discovered the document in „ > 

J ' §428. Its His- 

f orty-f our old, molded leaves which were brought tory and 
to him for kindling his fire, at the convent of escri P lon * 
St. Catherine, at the foot of Mount Sinai. He presented these 
leaves as the Codex Frederica- Augusta, in honor of his patron, 
the Saxon king, to the library of the University in Leipzig. 
These leaves belonged to the Old Testament. In 1859, Tisch- 
endorf in the same place found the remainder of the docu- 
ment, which he presented to his Kussian patron, Emperor 
Alexander II. In 1862 the government issued a magnificent 
fac simile of the manuscript in four folio volumes, as a me- 
morial of the One Thousandth Anniversary of the Russian 
Empire. Copies were presented to the great institutions and 
libraries of the world. About a dozen copies were sent to the 
United States, and are found in our great libraries. In the 
consensus of Christendom, the Codex Yaticanus and the Codex 
Sinaiticus are held for all critical purposes as the most ancient 
and most valuable of all the codices of the New Testament. 

The writing is in the uncial style, upon very fine thin 
vellum, in three hundred and forty-six and a half leaves, which 
are thirteen and a half inches in length by more than fourteen 
inches in breadth. The text of the New Testament is in four 



644 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

columns of forty-eight lines each on a page, the whole number 
of pages being one-hundred and forty-seven and a half. It is 
without accents or aspirates, without spacing between words, 
or large initials to indicate the beginning of a paragraph. In 
connection with this manuscript was found the Epistle of 
Barnabas, and a part of the Shepherd of Hernias, and a large 
portion of the Old Testament. 

4. The Codex of Eossano. 

This Codex Rossanensis is among the latest discoveries of 

manuscripts related to the New Testament. It takes its name 

o „ ™ ^ TT . from a village named Rossano, near which, on a 

§429. Its His- & ' ' 

tory and hill, the document was found, in South Italy, 
about three miles from the sea. It does not 
rank as first class for the objects of critical investigation; but 
it is easily first in respect to its pictorial illustrations, being 
the oldest pictorial Gospel known. It is adorned with about 
forty miniatures in rich and vivid colors, on the margins and 
spaces. The subjects are prominent scenes of the Gospels, — 
the Parable of the Ten Yirgins and the Bridegroom ; the Tri- 
umphal Entry of Jesus into Jerusalem ; Judas Restoring the 
Thirty Pieces of Silver, and in the background is depicted 
his body dangling from the bough of a tree ; the Scene of the 
Lord's Agony in Gethsemane; and a representation of the 
four Evangelists, each bearing a book on his left arm, while 
the right hand is extended in the act of benediction. Profess- 
ors Gebhardt and Harnack, who discovered this work, issued 
a descriptive volume of the manuscript, with fao similes and 
miniatures in outline and monochrome. 

The document is a thick quarto, bound in strong black 
leather, containing the two Gospels of Matthew and Mark — a 
purple vellum of one hundred and eighty-eight pages, written 
in uncial letters, in double columns of silver text, twenty lines 
to the column, and from nine to twelve letters to the line. 
The first three lines of each Gospel are written with gold. 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 645 

The words are without spaces, without accents, without aspi- 
rates, with few erasures, and with only an occasional punctua- 
tion. It has the Ammonian sections and the Eusebian canons. 
From these internal evidences of its antiquity, it is assigned 
as having been written in the fifth, or at least the sixth, cen- 
tury. 

These are the principal Greek manuscripts yet discovered 
of a high antiquity and superior authority. They furnish im- 
portant advantages for the critical study of the 
New Testament. But some passages have been " of 
rendered doubtful by liberties taken with the 
text in transcribing these sacred books. The alteration of a 
single letter by mistake, or by the insertion of a word explan- 
atory, written by the copyist or the reader on the margin of 
the document, became incorporated into the text by a subse- 
quent transcriber, has the effect to put the true and original 
text in doubt. A careful and critical comparison and editing 
of the several texts collated, furnish the means of detecting 
and correcting any such error. Truly these instances of cor- 
rupting the text are in most unimportant passages, and in the 
vast majority of instances are a mere matter of spelling ; but 
clearly where the sense is changed even in minor details, one 
prefers fact to fiction. The critical Michselis classed these 
divers readings, attributing them to one of the following 
causes or occasions, viz. : 

" 1. The omission, addition, or exchange of letters, syllables, or 
words, from the mere carelessness of the transcribers. 

" 2. Mistakes of the transcribers in regard to the true text of the 
original. 

"3. Errors or imperfections in the ancient manuscripts from which 
the transcriber copied. 

"4. Critical conjecture, or intended improvements of the original 
text. 

"5. Willful corruptions [made in some copies] to serve the purpose 
of a party, whether orthodox or heterodox." 

A very natural question arises whether scholars may not 
be exposed to the imposition of spurious documents by experts 



646 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

in old Scriptology? Frauds have been attempted again and 
«.«, ^ ^ again. It was the opinion of Dr. Scrivener that 

§431. Detection ° r 

of in England alone there were at least fifty differ- 

ent persons who could detect the most skillfully- 
executed fraud of this character that the world could produce, 
on the mere internal evidence of the case. Some remarkable 
instances are cited. In 1856, one Constantine Simonides, a 
most accomplished impostor, tried to sell, along with certain 
genuine manuscripts, a document purporting to be a classical 
history of an Egyptian. Dr. Tischendorf detected the fraud 
and telegraphed to Berlin to beware of the spurious document. 
Upon arriving, Simonides offered his manuscript for sale, when 
it was tested microscopically and also chemically, with the re- 
sult that he was instantly arrested for attempted imposture. 
The same man, in the same way, offered for sale in the Bod- 
leian Library, at Oxford, England, some genuine manuscripts 
and some fragments produced skillfully in the uncial text, the 
vellum being stained with age and bearing all the marks char- 
acteristic of a very early antiquity. The librarian merely 
smelled the leaves, and returning the fragments said that they 
dated in the middle of the nineteenth century ! 

The Versions of the New Testament. 

The early translations were made from the Greek manu- 
scripts into the vernacular speech of the various nations, and 
circulated widely. These constitute another and 

§432. The Uses J 

of the more ancient source for determining the genu- 

ineness and authenticity of the sacred books. 
Being written in different languages and dialects, this fact in 
itself erects impassable barriers against success in any at- 
tempted corruptions of the sacred text. Versions, therefore, 
constitute an independent and invaluable line of Christian evi- 
dence, some of them antedating, and others paralleling, the 
proofs furnished by the Greek manuscripts already cited. 
Only the most important versions are here mentioned. 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 647 

1. The Old Latin Version. This is claimed as first in 
value and in time, dating about the middle of the second cen- 
tury. Tertullian of Carthage, Cyprian of Alexandria, and 
Augustine of Africa, were familiar with this translation. It 
was used in the fourth century in Piedmont and Lombardy, in 
Xorthern Italy. The version originated in Africa about A. D. 
150. Christianity spread rapidly then, and the Old Latin 
version went with Christianity. It contains the Canon of the 
New Testament. 

Out of this Old Latin version came the Vulgate, which 
is held in such high honor, a revision made by the scholarly 
Jerome. He began his work at Home in A. D. 383, and con- 
cluded it in his monastic cell, in the Church of the Nativity, 
at Bethlehem of Judaea, in 385. The revision was urged 
upon Jerome by the Roman Bishop Damasus, and was in- 
tended for the common people speaking the Latin language, as 
its name imports. Dr. Scrivener remarks of the revision : 

"As an interpretation, the Vulgate far surpasses its prototype; as 
an instrument of criticism, it is decidedly superior, where the evidence 
of the Old Latin may be had, bringing before us the testimony, good 
and bad, of documents of the second century; but only that of the 
manuscripts which Jerome deemed correct and ancient at the end of 
the fourth [century]." 

2. The Syriac Versions. These constitute a second class 
of the first importance. The Aramcean branch of the Semitic 
family of languages was used in Northern Syria. These 
Versions are among the most ancient and most valued of the 
JSTew Testament. These are : 

a) The Peshito ; that is, " simple, literal, faithful." It is 
written in Old Syriac, and is dated by most scholars near the 
middle of the last half of the second century ; but Michaelis 
places it in the first century. Eusebius says of Hegesippus, 
the first Christian historian after the Evangelists, that " he also 
states some particulars [citations] from the Gospel of the He- 
brews, and from the Syriac." The Peshito is wanting in the 



648 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Second and Third Epistles of John, Second Epistle of Peter, 
that of Jude, and also Eevelation. It contains all the rest of 
our Canon. The version is remarkable for its purity and 
exactness of translation. The Syrian Christians hold that 
their version is the original New Testament, which claim, 
however, is hardly valid. Nevertheless the Churches in Syria 
have certainly had in unbroken use these Scriptures from an 
early antiquity until now. 

P) The Gureton Version. This is so named in respect to 
Dr. Cureton, who discovered and first published it. It is a 
fragment of eighty-two and a half leaves, but is one of the 
earliest of the Syriac versions. It was discovered in 1842 
in a convent of the desert, about seventy miles northwest 
from the city of Cairo, in Egypt. Scrivener seems to place 
the date in the fifth century, and says that it is " inferior in 
every respect to the primitive version, which is still read 
throughout the Churches of the East." But other critics, 
such as Cureton, Tregelles, Alford, Ewald, Bleek, and others 
also, believe that this text dates earlier than the Peshito. 

y) The Harldean Syriac Version belongs to the fifth cen- 
tury, and was written by the heretical Bishop Xenias, of 
Eastern Syria. It is in the Protestant College at Beirut. 

B) A Syrian Gospel, discovered in 1895 at St. Catherine 
convent, Mount Sinai, has attracted considerable attention 
recently. A photograph of this, with several other docu- 
ments in Syriac, Greek, and Arabic, was taken by Mrs. Lewis 
and her twin sister, Mrs. Gibson, from Cambridge, England. 
The Syriac Codex consisted of one hundred and ten pages 
Its peculiarity is in differing from all the Gospels of the Canon 
in representing the opposite of the doctrine of the Incarna- 
tion. It reads : " Joseph, to whom was betrothed the Virgin 
Mary, begat Jesus, who was called Christ." This circum- 
stance, indicating a departure from all the Greek manuscripts 
which were original, would suggest that its origin was due to 
a heretic of the middle of the second century, which is the 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 649 

date claimed for this document. If so, it is the recovery of 
one of those corrupted and mutilated Gospels issued by the 
Gnostics or Ebionites of that period, when they chose to alter 
the text to conform to their own peculiar preconceived views 
of what the Gospel ought to teach. 

3. The Egyptian Versions are otherwise known as the 
Coptic Versions. They are written in three dialects, namely : 

a) The Memphitic {JBahiric) dialect, which was spoken in 
Lower Egypt, of which there are extant twenty-eight manu- 
scripts of the Gospels, seventeen of Acts, the Pauline, and the 
General Epistles, and ten of the Book of Kevelation. This 
version is held to be the purest and freest from corruptions of 
all those of the second century. 

/?) The Thebaic (Sahidic) Version, which belonged to 
Upper Egypt, is a mere fragment. 

y) The Bashmuric {Elearchian) Version was made in the 
third century. It consists of fragments of John's Gospel and 
of the Pauline Epistles. 

These several versions go quite far in filling up the gap be- 
tween the writing of the Gospels in A. D. 55-65 and the first 
Greek manuscripts dating 325 A. D. 

The Canon of the New Testament. 

The term Canon 9 originally meant a measuring rule in 
mechanics. It thence easily acquired the figurative sense of a 
rule of life. In its application to religion, it 

rr ° ' §433. Meaning 

imports the rule which tests our faith and prac- of the 
tice. When applied to the Scriptures, it is 
called the Sacred Canon, meaning that rule by which the sev- 
eral books which constitute the Bible were originally placed 
in authority in the Church as containing the Word of God. 
The term Canon is here employed with special reference to 
the respective books of the New Testament, whether viewed 
as individual writings, or collectively as a body of Scrip- 

^Kav&v, Canon. 



650 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

tures, and the maimer in which they came to be regarded as 
the authoritative source and standard of Christian belief. 

A false notion has gained considerable publicity and cre- 
dence respecting the method by which these books had as- 
signed to them a canonical character. It is sup- 
canon and posed by some that the claim of these writings 
to this high authority originated in and is due 
to the decision of a Churchly Council; that the several docu- 
ments constituting our New Testament were subjected to 
a selection of this literature to the exclusion of other litera- 
ture of equal claim, by a class of incapable men at the Council 
of Nicsea in A. D. 325, who arbitrarily voted these books into 
the Canon, and as arbitrarily rejected the others, in accord- 
ance with their own peculiar ignorance, caprice, and power as a 
majority ! The hypothesis is a fiction, and is utterly destitute 
of historical truth. The sacred Canon did not originate in 
that way ; and the Council of Niccea did not touch the subject. 
Neither at Jerusalem where Christianity was cradled, nor at 
Rome where it centralized, nor at Antioch where the disciples 
were first called Christians, nor yet at Nica?a where the first 
Ecclesiastical Council met in the presence of Constantine the 
first Christian emperor, was any such movement known or 
contemplated. We do not find in history that the apostles of 
Jesus in their collective capacity, or their pupils the Apostolic 
Fathers, or any of their successors, adopted a procedure so 
absolutely unsafe and absurd. Nor could such a course have 
won the confidence, much less have commanded the faith of 
the myriads of intelligent people who hastened to embrace 
the Christian religion at the peril of their lives, in the first 
epochs of Christianity. Now, no man is willing to die for a 
lie, he knowing it to be such ; but multitudes of men, women, 
and even children, who were in a position to know whereof 
they affirmed, surrendered life itself under the cruelest con- 
ditions that could be imposed, rather than yield their confi- 
dence in the Christ of these Scriptures. If such procedure 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 651 



had been historical, the New Testament were a worthless class 
of documents. 

It is always difficult to trace mere myths to their origin. 
But something more than a half -century ago, William Hone, of 
Great Britain, issued two editions of a work which ajtnm „ 

' §435. Fiction 

first appeared with this truthful title, The Apoc- for 

ryphal New Testament, but with the purpose of 1S ° ry ' 
disparaging our authentic and Canonical Scriptures. Subse- 
quently he issued a new edition with the title-page reading : 
"The Suppressed Gospels and Epistles of the Original New 
Testament of Jesus Christy venerated by the Primitive Chris- 
tian Churches during the first four centuries, but since, after 
violent disputations, forbidden by the Bishops of Nicene Coun- 
cil, in the reign of the Emperor ConstantineP It would seem a 
sufficient refutation of the pretense, that these two title-pages 
be held up in open contradiction of each other. The first title 
affirms that the writings were spurious', the second denies the 
admission, insisting that they are historical! The claim that 
any " violent disputation" whatever occurred respecting receiv- 
ing any books into the Sacred Canon, in the Council of Nicaea, 
is altogether fabulous. Mr. Hone was at that time an ardent 
adversary of Christianity ; but he is said to have since regret- 
ted the publication of his book in the form given, and with the 
object of its issue. He represented that our Scriptures of the 
New Testament were selected out of a large number of other 
works on the same subject, of equal worth and acceptability ; 
and that the selection was made arbitrarily by ignorant and 
incompetent persons, who were unworthy of our confidence 
His work was offered as an answer to his own question : " After 
the writings contained in the New Testament were selected 
from the numerous Gospels and Epistles, what became of the 
books that were rejected by the compilers?" Mr. Hone also 
cites an old fable of the Dark Ages, "a mediaeval story,"* which 
originated centuries after the Nicene Council, to the effect 
that the selection of our Canonical New Testament was "made 



* Indorsed by Hackel, in Riddle of the Universe, p. 327. 



652 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

by a miracle ; that a number of books were placed upon and 
under a given table; that the party in charge then prayed over 
the matter and retired for the night ; that in the morning it 
was found that the right books had of themselves jumped upon 
the table, and the wrong books had gone under the table ; and 
that the Sacred Canon of the New Testament was thus settled ! 
Now, surprising to say, this credulous and superstitious Mr. 
Hone found readers just as gullible as himself, who believed 
that this fable was a fact ! This man, however, grows sus- 
picious that his position is untenable, and shifts his ground. 
After citing Jortin's opinion on the supposed violence of that 
Council, he intimates that if the selection of out Canon did not 
actually occur as described, it was made by the people no more 
entitled to respect than were the members of that Council! In 
this, Mr. Hone yields his former claim as entirely fictitious, 
and makes another affirmation equally groundless. He then 
furnishes his own preferred apocryphal G-ospels, Acts, and 
Epistles, having shaped the documents conformably in chapters 
and verses with the Canonical Books ; and in this particular 
attempts to do what he charges upon the Council as having 
done — attempts to perpetrate a fraud upon the world ! 

It is in place now to consider the proofs that the Mcene 

Council entertained no proposition whatever respecting the 

Canon of the New Testament. The first authority 

§436. The J 

Historical to be cited is that of Professor George Salmon, 
canon. D ^ R R g ^ ^ of the Tj n i versity f Berlin, 

now Provost of Trinity College, Dublin, in his Historical In- 
troduction to the Boohs of the New Testament. Referring to 
this apocryphal account of the origin of our Canon, he re- 
marks : 

"I need not tell you that the Council of Nicsea did not meddle [at all] 
with the subject of the Canon, and we need not trouble ourselves in discussing 
the proofs. . . . The fact is, that, as I have told you, authority did not 
meddle with the question, . . . and instead of this abstentation 
weakening the authority of our sacred books, the result has been that 
the great majority have higher authority than if their claim rested on 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 653 

the decision of any Council, however venerable. They rest on the spon- 
taneous consent of the whole Christian world, the Churches the most remote 
agreeing independently to do honor to the same books. Some of the books 
which Mr. Hone printed as left out ' by the compilers of our Canon/ 
were not in existence when the Canon was established ; and the best of 
the others is separated in the judgment of any sober man, by a wide 
interval from those which we account Canonical." 10 

Bishop B. F. Westcott, than whom there is no higher crit- 
ical authority of the past century on the subject of The 
Canon of the New Testament^ says : 

" The first Synod at which the books of the Bible were made the sub- 
ject of a special ordinance, was that of Laodicea [about A. D. 365], in 
Phrygia Pacatiana. . . . Neither in this [Nicene Council], nor in the 
following Councils, were the Scriptures themselves ever the subject of dis- 
cussion. They underlie all controversy as a sure foundation, known and 
immovable." " Scripture was the source from which the champions and 
assailants of the orthodox faith derived their premises." 11 

Since the Scriptures were the basis of discussion, and not 
the subject discussed, it is obvious that, at some earlier time 
and by some other mode, our Canon was established as the 
basis. The sanction as well as the sanctity of these sacred 
books must be discovered in the immediate relations existing 
between the apostolic writers and those persons and Churches 
to whom the writings, in the first instance, were handed or 
sent by the respective authors. How could it be otherwise? 
The conditions for securing acceptance were ample to satisfy 
the most critical ; but they were at the farthest remove from 
a Churchly Council. 

Bishop Westcott again remarks : 

"That a book should be ' acknowledged ' as Canonical, it was requi- 
site that its authenticity should be undisputed [universally] , and that its 
author should have been possessed of apostolic power ; if it were supposed 
to fail in satisfying either of these conditions, then it was 'disputed,' 
however well it satisfied the other [condition]." 12 

The first public cognizance given the Canon was that of 
the small Synod of Laodicea, " a gathering of the clergy from 

™Introd. pp. 175, 176. » The Canon of the New Testament, 429, 430, 481. 

"J b. 421. 

42 



654 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

parts of Lydia and Phrygia," composed of thirty-two members. 
They did not attempt to determine what books 
of were to be held as Canonical, but they took 

action formally to define, in a public manner, 
those books which historically had been accepted and recog- 
nized as Canonical from the time that they were first pub- 
lished. That is, the Synod did not make any selection of the 
sacred boohs at all, but for certain reasons catalogued the boohs 
as having been Canonical from the beginning. The effect of 
this action was to give publicity, emphasis, and confirmation to 
the Canon as originally established by the apostles, which until 
then had never had the formality of « public declaration by the 
Church. Now, evidently, to ratify a given matter, is not to 
originate it / and merely to give it public utterance is not to 
mahe a public selection of literature. The Synod of Laodicea 
did not create the sacred Canon. It reaffirmed the universal 
consensus of the Church from the time of the apostles for three 
centuries. There its function ceased. 

The immediate occasion for cataloguing the sacred books 

and giving public announcement of the Canon, as was done at 

Laodicea, was the character of the literature 

§438. The Oc- ' 

casion for which had appeared and claimed a rivalship in 
uc c ion. sorne sensa Works of fiction purporting to give 
the life of Christ ; spurious Epistles bearing the forged names 
of the apostles, as well as the corrupted and mutilated Scrip- 
tures which the heretics had produced, necessitated such a 
movement. Otherwise it was in the power of any impostor 
to circulate and palm off these apocryphal and fictitious writ- 
ings upon the unwary as being apostolical and Canonical. To 
protect the Church of Christians, especially the converts and 
those wishing to become such, and all Christian communities, 
against fraud in all matters involving the sacred faith in 
Christ, it was indispensable that the distinction should be 
made known and be preserved inviolate between this sacred 
and secular literature. In consequence, it is said that no apoc- 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 655 

ryphal writing ever found place on the catalogue of Canonical 
Books, or was ever referred to or quoted as being authorita- 
tive by either friends or foes of Christianity for many centu- 
ries. The apocryphal Scriptures were not in existence until 
from the middle of the second century and down to the fifth. 
So the Canonical Scriptures were long before recognized by 
the universal Church, and their character and authority thor- 
oughly established before the spurious literature appeared. 
The Apostolic Fathers, named Clement, Barnabas, Hermas, 
Ignatius, and Poly carp, were the first writers after the apos- 
tles; and they constantly allude to these Canonical writings, 
and to no others, as authoritative in all matters pertaining to 
the Church and the Christian religion. No apocryphal docu- 
?nent ever found place in the sacred Canon. 

That the Christian communities had steadfastly made this 
discrimination between the sacred and the secular literature 
is evident from facts occurring: during the terrible 

& P §439. This Dis- 

persecution in the joint reign of Diocletian and tinction 
Maximian in 303. The government proposed u ^ ra e 
the extermination of Christianity, and, for the first time in 
history, required that the Christians should bring forward and 
publicly burn their sacred books, under penalty of themselves 
being burned. The persecution derived its chief inspiration 
and force from Hierocles, proconsul of Bithynia at that date, 
and afterwards at Alexandria (306), a man who was well 
acquainted with the Canonical literature. Some Christians 
brought forward spurious books and burned them, which was 
satisfactory to the inquisitorial magistrates ; but their Christian 
brethren viewed the procedure as highly wrong and deceptive, 
merely to avoid persecution, and did not hesitate to call them 
"traitors."™ A schism followed and a controversy which 
lasted for three hundred years. Dr. Schaff observes : 

" In 303 Diocletian issued in rapid succession three edicts, each more 
severe than its predecessor. Maximian issued the fourth, the worst of 



Traditores. 



656 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

all, on April 30, 304. Christian churches were to be destroyed ; all copies 
of the Bible were to be burned ; all Christians were to be deprived of 
public office and civil rights ; and last of all, all without exception were 
to sacrifice to the gods upon the pain of death. Pretext for this severity- 
was afforded by the occurrence of fire twice in the palace of Nicomsedia, 
where Diocletian resided." 14 

This wide destruction of the Christian Scriptures accounts 
for the fact that we have at present no earlier Greek manu- 
scripts transmitted to us of the New Testament than those 
dating 325 A. D. ; namely, the Codex Yaticanus and the 
Codex Sinaiticus. In reference to this persecution Bishop 
Westcott again remarks : 

"The books of the New Testament were formed into distinct collec- 
tions — ' a quaternion of Gospels ;' l fourteen Epistles of St. Paul ;' ' seven 
Catholic Epistles.' Both in the West and in the East the persecutor 
had done his work, and a New Testament rose complete from the fires 
which were kindled to consume it. That it rested on no authoritative 
decision [of a Council] is simply a proof that none was needed ; and in 
the next chapter it will be seen that Conciliar Canons introduced no 
innovations, but merely proposed to preserve the tradition which had been 
handed down." "But . . . the ordeal of persecution left the African 
Churches in possession of a perfect New Testament." 15 

Very many catalogues of these Scriptures have come down 

to us ; some incomplete, others almost perfect, and all made at 

§440. cata- different dates, by different persons, Churches, or 

th^New Councils. Those which agree exactly with our 
Testament. Canon now, are eleven in number. They are here 
presented in their chronological order, as follows : 

1. That of Augustine (A. D. 355), a man of powerful influ- 
ence and great activity in the establishment of the collective 
Canon in the "Western Church. 

2. That of Athanasius the Great (d. 373), "the Father of 
Orthodoxy," in a Festal Epistle, gives our Canonical Books. 

3. That of Philastrius (387), Bishop of Brescia, Italy, is 
also identical. 

4. That of Jerome (390), a man of rarest talents and schol- 
arly attainments; a remarkable Biblicist, possessing extraor- 
dinary influence in the Western Church. 

uffist. Christ. Church, II, 66. i& Canon of N. T., pp. 425, 414. 



M ANTTSCRIPTS — Versions C ANON. 657 

5. That of the Third Council of Carthage (397) at Hyppo, 
a ratification. 

6. That of Epiphanius (403), the Patriarch of Orthodoxy, 
Bishop of Constantiathe, capital of Cyprus, in his larger work 
against Heresies. 

7. That of Gelasius (405), which declares our Canonical 
Books. 

8. That of Rujmus (d. 410), of Aquileia, Italy, whose list 
is identical with ours. 

9. That of Innocens 1 (d. 417), a Koman bishop, attests 
our Canon. 

10. That of Leontius (590), a Byzantine by birth, and 
Bishop of Cyprus. 

11. That of Isidore (d. 636), of Seville, leader in the Span- 
ish Church, and president of two Councils, contains the same. 

The Council of Trent (A. D. 1546)* was distinctively a 
Boman Catholic affair. It was the only Council that under- 
took to construct a Canon for themselves, and „ _ „,, 

' §441. The 

this related exclusively to the Old Testament. council 
The object of having the Council was to condemn 
the Protestant principles and doctrines. For the first time 
in the history of the Church, the books of the Bible were 
made an article of faith. While this Council did not touch 
the Canon of the E~ew Testament, it did add the several 
Apocryphal Books of the Old Testament, and put them upon 
the same plane with the Scriptures — books which had never 
claimed to be sacred or Canonical. This was a matter of deep 
offense and stern indignation on the part of Protestantism, 
which rejected the decree outright. On February 15, 1546, 
the Council of Trent passed the decree, and published it on 
the 8th of April following, reading thus: 

"The Holy and ^Ecumenical Council of Trent, . . . following 
the example of the orthodox Fathers, receives and venerates all the 

* May 1, 1564, was the date assigned the decrees were made binding. (Encycl. 
Britt. Vol. XXIII, 585, Phil'a edition. Westcott assigns the decree to April 8, 1546^ 
when the decree was finally adopted. {Canon of N. T., p. 476.) 



658 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

books of the Old and New Testaments . . . and also traditions per- 
taining to faith and conduct, . . . and with equal feeling of devo- 
tion and reverence." (Here is given a catalogue of the books of the 
Old and New Testaments; and the Apocryphal books named Tobit, 
Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, and First and Second Maccabees are 
added as sacred). "If, however, any one does not receive the entire 
books with all their parts as they are accustomed to be read in the 
Catholic Church, and in the Old Latin Vulgate edition [Jerome's with 
additions] as sacred and Canonical, and knowingly and wittingly de- 
spises the aforesaid traditions, let him be Anathema." 

Martin Luther condemned this action of the Council of 
Trent unqualifiedly ; he said " A Council can not make that to 
be Scripture which is not Scripture by nature." John Calvin 
denounced the decree as " a most pernicious error, [viz.] that 
the Scriptures have only so much right as is conceded to them 
by the suffrages of the Church ; as though the eternal and in- 
violable truth of God depends on the arbitrary will of men!" 
Bishop Westcott remarks : 

"This fatal decree . . . was ratified by fifty-three prelates, 
among whom there was not one German, not one scholar distinguished 
for historical learning, not one who was fitted by special study for the 
examination of the subject, in which the truth could only be determined 
by the voice of antiquity. How completely the decision was opposed to 
the spirit and letter of the original judgments of the Greek and Latin 
Churches, how far in the doctrinal equalization of the disputed and 
acknowledged books of the Old Testament it was at variance with the 
traditional opinion of the West, how absolutely unprecedented was the 
conversion of an ecclesiastical usage into an article of belief, will be seen 
from the evidence which has already been adduced." 16 

So far respecting Councils and the settlement of the Sacred 
Canon. 

If the Sacred Canon did not originate in the authority of 

any Council, it must have had its origin directly between the 

writer and the parties addressed. The Evangel- 

§442. How r ° 

Books Became ists handed the Gospels in person to those who 

canonical. ^^ requested them to be apostolically and 

authoritatively written. The Epistles, going out to distant 

countries, addressed to Churches, required to be carefully and 

is WestcotVs Canon of the N. T., 477, 478. 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 659 

satisfactorily authenticated to find acceptance. They must 
come properly authenticated as apostolical, or the writing was 
held in "dispute;" not condemned absolutely, but held in sus- 
pense until the evidence satisfactory was furnished. Only per- 
sons of eminence in the Church were intrusted with bearing to 
the Churches an apostolical writing. The means and methods 
of travel for the conveying and circulating of sacred books 
were extremely slow. If a given document was returned for 
inspection and for the proper guarantees, much time was some- 
times consumed before the document reached its ultimate des- 
tination and was universally accepted. Individuals could not 
traverse alone mountains and seas ; they must delay for cara- 
vans and company. They must pass from one nation to another 
speaking a different language. Like the apostles in their mis- 
sionary journeys, they were exposed in city and country to 
dangers, on mountain and on sea to disease and robbers, and 
everywhere were "in deaths oft." It is therefore easy to un- 
derstand why a few of the smaller Epistles and the Apocalypse 
were slow in coming to hand and receiving acknowledgment, 
especially in case they were wanting in any of the indispen- 
sable requisites for their verification ; for no hook was consid- 
ered entitled to a place in the Sacred Canon until all the Churches 
of Christendom had independently, and upon proper guarantees, 
become entirely satisfied to give it recognition. Thus the Collect- 
ive Canon was organized. It sometimes occurred that a book, 
having justified its claim with some Churches, was " disputed" 
in other Churches where the claim had not yet been properly 
safeguarded. But it was not held to be Canonical without 
universal consent. Hence the occasion for long delays in the 
acknowledgment of its apostolicity. Paul was extremely care- 
ful in that his name appeared in the text at the beginning of 
every Epistle, and often at the end in connection with saluta- 
tions, together with his personal and private " token in every 
Epistle." All this delay over a "disputed" writing, so far 
from creating suspicion respecting its claim, is a commendation 



660 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

of the critical care which finally, on sufficient warrant of evi- 
dence, assigned it a place in the Sacred Canon by the universal 
consensus of the Churches. 

In the first instance, all Christendom placed its ancient seal 
upon each individual book, and again upon the whole coilect- 
§443. The ively, before these documents received sacred 
conclusion, canonicity. Moreover, it is a grateful circum- 
stance to us that these writings have been transmitted to our 
hands with evidence so multiform and conclusive of their claim 
to authenticity and apostolicity. After all the early attempts 
to corrupt, and mutilate or absolutely destroy these Scrip- 
tures by burning, it is a matter of deep satisfaction to know 
that, kept in the custody of the Church with such jealous care, 
they have come down to us with marks of their imperishable pu- 
rity and truth. Written originally in Greek, those ancient manu- 
scripts which we now have in our possession attest the identity 
of their contents with our own sacred books. Translated into 
other languages and dialects, the ancient versions tell the story 
of preservation from corruption and destruction. Persons of 
eminence, having these documents in their possession for daily 
use in study, made constant and copious reference and citations 
in their own writings. The adversaries of Christianity in 
their active assaults upon the system, holding in their hands 
these Canonical Books, defiantly charged the authorship of the 
writings upon the apostles, giving each his proper name. 
Eleven Catalogues extending along the centuries, with a view 
to mark and preserve the discrimination between the sacred 
and the spurious, between the apostolic and the apocryphal, 
ratify completely our own Canon. The action of the early 
Councils to make public the same distinction, also confirmed 
and announced what had always been the consensus of the 
Church respecting the apostolical authenticity of its Scrip- 
tures — all attesting singly and unitedly the just claims of these 
writings to sacred canonicity. 

Then, most of all, there has existed an institution with a 



Manuscripts — Versions — Canon. 661 

history of unbroken continuity, possessing an indestructible 
character and power in the world, which has been the watch- 
ful custodian of these Scriptures from the first. Its witness is 
invincible. That institution is the great Christian Church. 
From the founding of Christianity, whatever of character for 
power and glory it has possessed before mankind, it has pro- 
fessedly derived from its Founder, whose personality and 
life are the subject of the contents of these Scriptures. No 
other works of like antiquity have come down to us so com- 
pletely inwrought and overwrought with the very seals and 
stamp of truth and apostolicity in the recognition of the 
wisest and most critical men. But the complete and final test 
of the Divine origin of these writings is, that it brings to our 
spiritual nature supreme satisfactions just where all else 
fails — that which rules us by a Divine right. It offers a 
gracious challenge to every man's consciousness to which it 
appeals. "If any man wills to do His will, he shall know 
of the doctrines whether they are of God." 



APPENDIX. 

I. Excursus A. Josephus's Testimony Respecting Jesus Christ. 

II. Excursus B. Pliny's State Paper to the Emperor Trajan, 

III. Excursus C. Logia of the Lord, or the " Sayings of Jesus." 

IV. Excursus D. The Didache, or the " Teaching of the Twelve 

Apostles." 
V. Excursus E. The Muratorian Canon; Description and Con- 
tent. 
VI. Excursus F. The Jewish Talmud : Expurgated Editions re- 
specting Christ. 
VII. Excursus G. The Toledoth Jeshu, or " Gospel According to 
the Jews." 

a) Exhibit A . On the Chronology of the New Testament. 

/S) Exhibit B. On the High Priests and the Procurators of Pales- 
tine. 

7) Exhibit C. On Critical Opinions respecting Chronology of the 
Testimonies. 

5) Exhibit D. Table of Comparative Contemporaries of the Sev- 
eral Witnesses. 

e) Exhibit E. Chronological Table of the Content of the Entire 
Work. 



EXCUKSUS A. 

Testimony of Josephus concerning Jesus. 

Tiverai 5t Kara tovtov rbv %pbvov 'Irjcrovg-, <ro<pb? avrjp, efye &vdpa afrrbv \&yeiv 
XPV- '~& v yfy Trapa56i;U)P zpyiav ttoltjt^, 8iddaKa\o^ avdpibirwv tQv i)doprj rdXridrj 
be£op.4vwv. Kai iroWovg- p£v 'lovdalov?, iroWov?, 5£ xal tov ''EWtjvikov iirrjydyeTo. 
'0 XP 1(TT ^ o^to? fy' Kat avrbv ivdeii-ei ruv irpSiTwv avdpujv trap ijfuv crraupy 
iiriTeTip.r]K6T0? lUXaTou, ovk eiraiaavro oiyt irpurov avrbv ayair-fiaavTe?, i(pdvrj yap 
avTOi? TpiTrjv %x uiV Vf x ^P av ird\iv fov, ru>v deicjv irpo<pr)TG)v ravrd re Kal &\\a fivpca 
dav[xd<na irepl avrov elpTjKOTtav. Et$- in vvv tCop XP 10 "™ V & V a 71 *^ rcvde &vopLao~p.6v(tiv 
ovk eTriXiire rb <pv\ov. 

[translation.] 
" About this time arises Jesus, a wise man, if indeed it be right to 
call him a man ; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a Teacher of men 
accepting the truth with pleasure. There followed him many of the 
Jews as well as also many of the Greeks. He was the Christ. And at 
the instigation of the chief men among us, Pilate had condemned him 
to the cross ; those having loved him at the first did not cease. For 
he appeared to them alive again on the third day, the divine prophet 
having proclaimed both these things, and also ten thousand other 
wonderful things concerning him. And that class of those called Chris- 
tians after him are not extinct unto this present time." (Jewish An- 
tiquities, Bk. xviii, c. 3, § 3.) 

DISCUSSION. 

Respecting the authenticity and integrity of this celebrated para- 
graph in the writings of Josephus, there has been considerable contro- 
versy among modern critics. Opinions have divided into three classes: 

1) Those holding that the entire passage is an unqualified interpola- 
tion. 

2) Those contending that it is authentic in part, but certain parts 
interpolated. 

3) Those who maintain that the paragraph in its entirety is abso- 
lutely authentic. 

It is an historical question, and must be treated as such upon the 
evidence of the case, without preconceived conclusions. After travers- 
ing the grounds pro and con, the reader will determine for himself the 
evidential value of each claim cited. 

1. The Passage is an Interpolation. 

1. It interrupts the general narrative. This is a question of fact, and 
must be settled by a reference to the paragraph in its connection as it 

665 



666 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

stands. The author is tracing the several procedures of Pilate in the 
two preceding sections, which naturally suggest and lead up to the cruci- 
fixion of Jesus as his most iniquitous act. With much more propriety 
might the section which follows this be regarded as a digression ; never- 
theless, it has never yet been so claimed. Luke's reference to Herodias 
(Gospel, iii, 19, 20) is certainly very much more of a digression from the 
direct line of discourse than is this passage now in question ; yet no one 
on that account has even suspected the digression in Luke of being an 
interpolation. Obviously the fact does not justify the inference. 

2. It is incompatible with the views of a Jew thus to refer to Jesus. That 
is to say, " If it be right to call him a man, ... a doer of many 
wonderful works," but especially to say that " He is the Christ" would, 
by necessary implication, make Josephus, a stanch Jew, a Christian. 
Upon the contrary, it is maintained that such a conclusion is by no 
means necessitated. Josephus was an historian of liberal mind and 
characteristics towards others, always treating opposing views with due 
consideration and courtesy. There were other stanch Jews of that period 
who went quite as far as Josephus in their references to Christ and his 
apostles, but were never cognized as having become Christians on that 
account. For instance, Nicodemus, who is said to have been the third 
officer of the Jewish Sanhedrin, in an interview with Jesus by night said: 
" Rabbi, we know that thou art a Teacher sent from God, for no man 
can do these miracles which thou doest, except God be with him." 
(John iii, 2.) Nicodemus also defended Christ in the Sanhedrin, and 
seems to have silenced His enemies. (John vii, 45-53.) But there is no 
evidence that Nicodemus became a Christian. So also Gamaliel, " a 
Pharisee, a doctor of the law, had in honor of all people," stood for the 
defense of the apostles in the presence of the Sanhedrin, opposing all 
violent measures being decreed against them (Acts v, 34-40) ; but it was 
never claimed that he professed Christianity. 

The strongest expression made by Josephus favoring Jesus was that 
" Re was the Christ" This may seem to convey more than was really 
meant. In another place this writer alludes to Jesus when mentioning 
that Ananus brought " James" before the Sanhedrin, " the brother of 
Jesus who was called the Christ" rbv ade\<pbv 'Irja-ov rov Xeyo/xepov xP ta " ro ^ 
'laKufiov dpo/Ad airy). So Penan claims : " Instead of xP La " r ^ ovrog- rjv [" He 
was Christ"], it was certainly xP L<rr °? ovto? iXey^ro he was called Christ." 
(Life of Jesus, Introd. p. 14, note.) The obvious sense, then, would be 
that among the many who rose among the Jews claiming to be the 
Christ, as Jesus had predicted, this one was pre-eminently called the 
Christ by the people. So Pilate placed the superscription upon the cross : 
"This is Jesus the King of the Jews " (Matt, xxvii, 37), not meaning 
literally that he was a monarch, but that he was called a King. (Com- 
pare John xviii, 37 ; xix, 14, 15 ; Luke xix, 38, etc.) Pilate, being himself 
the Roman procurator ruling the Jews, knew perfectly well that Jesus 
was not an earthly king, and did not claim earthly royalty. 



Appendix. 667 



3. TJie passage was not quoted for more than two centuries after Josephus 
had published his work on Jewish Antiquities. To this it is replied : Is it 
necessary that a given passage shall have been quoted at all in order to 
verify its authenticity? Citations clearly prove the existence of the 
original documents, but silence proves nothing. Tacitus, the greatest of 
Roman historians, who wrote about A. D. 110, is not cited for the first 
two hundred years. Thucydides, the greatest of the Greek historians, 
who wrote B.C. 470-403, is said not to have been quoted for the first five 
hundred years ! Both Thucydides and Herodotus wrote about the 
Romans, but neither mentions Rome, the old-world capital. Tacitus 
and Strabo (A. D. 18), both wrote of the Jews, but neither one mentions 
the Jewish sect known as the Essenes, though they are mentioned both 
by Josephus and also the Jew Philo. Does silence justify the belief that 
the Essenes did not exist? Eusebius, a friend and favorite of the 
Emperor Constantine, is silent respecting the death of Constantine's 
son named Orispus. Josephus, pre-eminently the Jewish historian, omits 
the edict of the Emperor Claudius which banished the Jews from Rome, 
although the circumstance is mentioned both by the Roman Suetonius 
and by Luke. Origen (248) refers to the fact that Josephus bore " wit- 
ness to John as having been a Baptist," and adds: " Now this writer, 
although not a believer in Jesus as the Christ, in seeking after the cause 
of the fall of Jerusalem [A. D. 70], . . . ought to have said that the 
conspiracy against Jesus was the cause of these calamities befalling the 
people, since they put to death Christ, being prophesied of," etc. ' (Origen 
contra Celsum, Bk. i, c 47.) And again: "It is wonderful that he who 
had not received Jesus as the Christ, should ascribe such righteousness 
to James," the Lord's brother. (Commentary on Matthew x, 17.) Now 
the curious question is legitimated : How is it that Origen should refer re- 
peatedly to Josephus' s opinion of Jesus Christ, if Josephus had never written 
any opinion whatever about Jesus? That is to be accounted for. 

2. The Passage is Mostly Genuine, but Paktly Interpolated. 

This position has been called a middle ground, and seems to be con- 
ceived in the desire of compromising the difficulty supposed. This view, 
however, is never accompanied by any facts to prove the historical char- 
acter of the hypothesis. Gieseler thinks the passage " is regarded with 
the greatest probability as genuine, but interpolated." He brackets the 
following sentences as spurious, but offers no reason whatever for the 
support of his opinion, viz.: "If it be right to call Him a man" — "a 
teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure." ..." He 
was the Christ" — " For he appeared again alive on the third day, the 
divine prophets declaring these things, and also ten thousand other 
wonderful things concerning him." These eliminations emasculate the 
paragraph of all its power, and what is left is not worth the place it 
occupies! Is it not strange, indeed, that so creditable a writer should 
take such liberties with an historical document, without a single fact 



668 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



reason, or analogy to substantiate his proposition? We have no right to 
believe without reason, and we have no right to disbelieve when we have 
the sufficient reason. The opinions of great men are to be weighed and 
respected ; but mere opinion carries no authority to the man who pro- 
poses to think for himself. Opinions are not evidence, and can not be 
substituted for evidence. Conclusions are too often the expression of 
inconsiderateness, conjecture, or merest prejudice, without fact or 
reason or investigation or probability to support them. It is a self-delu- 
sion to believe a given proposition because somebody else thinks so. 

The late French infidel, Kenan, conceded much when he wrote of 
Josephus's references as follows: " His brief notices of John the Baptist 
and Judas the Gaulonite are dry and colorless. . . I think the passage 
on Jesus is authentic. It is perfectly in the style of Josephus; and if the 
historian had made mention of Jesus, it would have been in that way." (Life 
of Jesus, Introd. p. 13.) 

3. The Passage in its Entirety is Genuine. 

So say Brethschneider, Hauteville, Schoedel, Oberthtlr, Whiston, 
Bomert, and Bottger, so far as distinguished opinions go. The chief rea- 
sons for this conclusion are these : 

1. All known manuscripts and versions of Josephus's works, without an 
exception, contain this testimony respecting Jesus. (See Schaff, Hist. Ch. 
Church, Vol. I, p. 92, 2d edition; also his Person of Christ, p. 191, note.) 
Now, the presence of this famous passage in every existing copy of his 
works, in every language in which it is found, is a powerful authenticative 
evidence as an historical evidence on an historical question, which, with 
nothing in opposition, compels belief. The answer is complete. De- 
mand can go no further. No fact in history can offer a better testi- 
mony. This fact must be refuted or the case is conclusive in itself. 
The burden of proof logically falls to the part of the objector to the 
authenticity of the passage. The reply to this is that " some Christian 
hand did the interpolating in multiplying copies." But what is the 
proof of the proposition? Without the evidence to substantiate the claim, 
it is offering the merest conjecture as proof, which is inadmissible. It is 
an historical question, and it must be treated in an historical manner, 
Conjectures are not facts, and can not be substituted for facts. The 
New Testament was also copied by Christian hands ; but does that legiti- 
mate the belief that they vitiated the integrity of those Scriptures? 
Eusebius (A. D. 315) cites this passage of Josephus twice, without the 
suspicion that it was in any wise spurious. It had never been ques- 
tioned. Not only so, but between A. D. 315 and 1440, no less than 
twenty-two writers of reputation, mostly historical, cite this passage as 
being universally considered unquestioned and unquestionable. (See 
Whiston's Josephus, App. 827-832.) 

2. It is in accordance with the style of Josephus. The internal evi- 
dence of Josephus's authorship is one of the very strongest proofs pos- 



Appendix. 669 



sible ; a point which seems to have been overlooked in the particular 
referred to. His characteristic manner of expression is found in this 
paragraph, and of itself is conclusive of its genuineness. A favorite and 
familiar formula of expression with this author when conveying the idea 
of a multitude, is "many ten thousand" or a phrasing closely resem- 
bling it. A few instances taken from Josephus's Antiquities, and also 
his Roman-Jewish Wars, gathered with very little research — by no 
means exhaustive — will amply illustrate the characteristic expression 
which finds place in the paragraph under consideration. Thus we read : 

1. Though he [Herod] were encompassed with ten thousand dan- 

gers." (Ant. Bk. xvii, c. 8, § 1.) 

2. " For there were not a few ten thousands of this people." ( lb. xv, 

3, 1.) 

3. "A great many ten thousands of people got together." (lb. xvii, 

10,2.) 

4. "At this time were ten thousand other disorders in Judaea." (lb. 

xvii, 10, 4.) 

5. "A great many ten thousands of Jews met Petronius." (lb. 

xviii, 8, 3.) 

6. " There came many ten thousands of Jews to Petronius." (lb. 

xviii, 8, 2.) 

7. "Jews . . . who came many ten thousands in number." (lb. 

xviii, 9, 5.) 

8. " I sent him . . . many ten thousands [Oori] of corn." (Wars, 

i, 20, 1.) 

9. "They were now become many ten thousands of armed men." 

(lb. ii, 21,7.) 

10. " Till ten thousand men on the Jews' side lay dead." ( lb. iii, 2, 2.) 

11. " Which had so many ten thousands of men to fight for it." (lb. 

vii, 8, 7.) 

12. "The Romans . . . were thus destroying ten thousand sev- 

eral ways." (lb. vii, 3, 1.) 

13. John " filled the country with ten thousand instances of wicked- 

ness." (lb. vii, 8, 1.) 

14. " The divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other 

wonderful things concerning Him" [viz., Christ]. (Antiq. xviii, 
3,3.) 

Here are no less than fourteen characteristic expressions of Josephus 
scattered through two of his greatest literary works — too many instances 
to be considered merely accidental ; are all these, therefore, inconclusive 
of his authorship? The phrase " ten thousand," etc., which occurs also in 
this disputed paragraph respecting Christ and his crucifixion, is internal 
evidence of the genuineness of the passage. Can a parallel be found 
in any two productions of any one man, of equal antiquity, and the case 
be spurious? The writer evidences his authorship with ingrain certi- 

43 



670 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



tude. The citations above of the characteristic language of Josephus's 
authorship are too obvious to be overlooked, too numerous to be accidental, too 
identifying to be reasonably denied. In the light of such proof can any 
thoughtful and candid mind rest in the conviction that this famous 
passage is not genuine? Can any substantial reason be adduced to 
prove that it is an interpolation? One's own preconception or preju- 
dice has no right to a place in such investigation. The mere opinions of 
others, without the reasons given, can not weigh in critical inquiry. For 
why should one man believe a proposition merely because somebody else 
thinks sof 

The claim is sometimes assumed that such testimony of Jesus 
Christ is too Christian to come from a Jew. But is such assumption an 
open criticism seeking for fact and truth? An a priori judgment is not 
the way of sound reasoning, but forestalls it. Moreover, if this sentence 
be admitted as authentic, it necessitates the admission of that which 
precedes it, upon which it depends. Josephus is giving a reason for the 
continued loyalty of Christ's disciples, after the terrible discourage- 
ment induced by his crucifixion. He says : " Those having loved him at 
the first did not cease [their affection]. For he appeared to them alive again 
on the third day, the divine prophets having proclaimed both these things, and 
also ten thousand other wonderful things respecting him." 

Evidently the admission of Christ's resurrection in itself legitimates 
the admissibilty of the fact that "he was the Christ." In the 
Jewish sense this was merely claiming that Jesus was the real Mes- 
siah of the Jews, with all the temporal aspects involved in the expecta- 
tions of that people at that period. 

In writing a history of the Jews, what sufficient reason can be as- 
signed why Josephus did not mention Jesus ? Would it not have been 
even more wonderful if he had so absolutely ignored him in view of 
his life and work? Is it rational to conclude that an historian as reli- 
able as he, could and did neglect or purposely omitted to mention 
Jesus Christ, who of all men was the Man of History? Yet this is 
precisely what Josephus did, if these two references (Ant., xvii ; 3, 3, 
and xx, 9, 1), which some have held in dispute, are to be considered 
as spurious. Yet the father of Josephus was the contemporary of 
Jesus. Marvelous it would have been if neither that father nor 
others of Jerusalem had never mentioned the name and fame of that 
great Teacher and Miracle-worker, whose brief life and countless 
deeds had wrought such a powerful impression in the land and for all 
time? It would indeed be more than unaccountable that so distin- 
guished an historian should not have one word to say of that One of all 
history who had stirred his generation and nation from center to cir- 
cumference, who revolutionized the religious world, and changed the 
course of human history, and who for two thousand years since has 
filled the centuries with his imperishable power and fame ! Who, with- 



Appendix. 671 



out a single historical proof to sustain the assumption, and without 
any reason that is conclusive and rational, can believe this in the face 
of the internal evidence cited? For the question of interpolation in 
this case can not be considered settled by mere conjectures, or by 
taking counsel of one's private prejudices. The burden of proof is 
upon the one who holds this section to be spurious. It must be proved, 
not assumed without proof. If one fail in furnishing the requisite his- 
torical facts, and in his reasoning on those facts, his proposition must be 
set down " not proved." He must withal critically refute the reasons 
here assigned for the contrary belief. 

Here the argument for the genuineness and authenticity of this 
passage of Josephus is closed. It is left with the reader to use his 
own judgment whether he accepts or omits the testimony of Josephus 
respecting Jesus Christ. His testimony really relates to three person- 
ages who are conspicuously named in the New Testament, namely : 

a) John the Baptist. (Ant. xviii, 5, 2). 

b) James the brother of our Lord. (Ant. xx, 9, 1). 

c) Jesus Christ. (Ant. xviii, 3, 3). 

EXCURSUS B. 

Epistle of Pliny to the Emperor Trajan. 
"C. Plinius Trajano Imp. S. :- 

" Health, Sire! It is my custom to refer to you all things about 
which I am in doubt. For who is more capable of directing my hesita- 
tion or instructing my ignorance ? 

11 1 have never been present at any trials of the Christians ; conse- 
quently, I do not know what is the nature of the crimes, or the usual 
strictness of their examination, or the severity of their punishment. 
I have hesitated not a little, whether any distinction was to be made in 
respect to age ; or whether those of tender years were to be treated the 
same as adults ; or whether repentance entitles them to pardon ; or 
whether it shall avail nothing for him who has been a Christian to 
renounce his error ; whether the name itself, even without any crime, 
should be subject to punishment, or only the crimes connected with the 
name. In the meantime I have pursued this course toward those who 
have been brought before me as Christians. I asked them whether they 
were Christians ; if they confessed [that they were], I repeated the ques- 
tion the second and a third time, adding threats of punishment. If they 
still persevered, I ordered them to be led away to punishment ; for I 
could not doubt, whatever the nature of their profession might be, that 
a stubborn and unyielding obstinacy certainly deserved to be punished 
[with death]. There were others also under like infatuation ; but as 
they were Roman citizens, I directed them to be sent to the capital. 



672 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

" But the crime spread as is wont to happen even while the prosecu- 
tions were going on, and numerous instances presented themselves. An 
information was presented to me without any name subscribed, accusing 
a large number of persons who denied that they were Christians, or ever 
had been. They repeated after me an invocation of the gods, and 
made offerings with frankincense and wine before your statue, which I 
had ordered to be brought in for this purpose, together with the images 
of the gods ; and, moreover, they reviled Christ ; whereas those who are 
truly Christians, it is said, can not be forced to do any of these things. 
I thought, therefore, that they ought to be discharged. Others who 
were accused by a witness confessed that they were Christians, but after- 
wards denied it. Some owned that they had been Christians, but said 
that they had renounced their error some three years before ; others 
more ; and a few even so long ago as twenty years. They all did homage 
to your statue and the images of the gods, and at the same time reviled 
the name of Christ. They declared that the whole of their guilt or 
error was that they were accustomed to meet on a stated day [stato die] 
before it was light and sing in a concert* praise to Christ as God, and to 
bind themselves by an oath,f not for the perpetration of any wickedness, 
but that they would not commit any theft, robbery, or adultery, or vio- 
late their word, nor refuse, when called upon, to restore anything com- 
mitted to their trust. After this, they were accustomed to separate, 
and then reassemble to eat in common a harmless meal. Even this they 
ceased to do after my edict, in which, agreeable to your commands, I 
forbade the meeting of secret assemblies. 

"After hearing this, I thought it the more necessary to endeavor to 
find out the truth, by putting to torture two female slaves called dea- 
conesses. But I could discover nothing but a perverse and extravagant 
superstition; and therefore I deferred all further proceedings until I 
should consult with you. For the matter appears to me worthy of such 
consultation, especially on account of the number of those who are in- 
volved in peril. For many of every age, of every rank, and of either 
sex, are exposed and will be exposed to danger. Nor has the contagion 
of the superstition been confined to the cities, but it has extended to 
the villages, and even to the country. Nevertheless, it still seems possi- 
ble to arrest the evil and apply the remedy. At least it is evident that 
the temples, which had been deserted, begin to be frequented and the 
sacred solemnities so long interrupted are again revived ; and the vic- 
tims, which heretofore could hardly find a purchaser, are now every- 
where in demand. From this it is easy to imagine what a multitude of 
men might be reclaimed, if pardon should be offered to those who 
repent." 



*Secum invicem = u alternately," perhaps responsive singing unto Christ. 
+ Sacramentum=a Roman oath of allegiance; secondly, religiously, an ob- 
ligation of loyalty to Christ. 



Appendix. 673 



EXCURSUS 0. 

The Logia of Our Lord; or, "The Sayings op Jesus." 

This is the title given to the fragment of an ancient document whose 
date is placed at A. D. 100-150. It consists of a brief and fragile leaf 
belonging to a book purporting to contain Christ's sayings in his ministry 
on earth. The single leaf measures three and three-fourths by five and 
three-fourths inches, but is broken off at the foot of the page. It was 
written on papyrus, and bears the ancient marks of contraction in cer- 
tain Greek words, such as characterize Biblical manuscripts of very early 
date, such as io anoc Gc, and an occasional n, represented by a hori- 
zontal stroke above the final letter. 

This fragment was very recently discovered, along with many other 
Greek manuscripts, on the edge of the Libyan or Western Desert, 
on the banks of Joseph's River ("Bahr Yusuf"), about seven miles 
from the River Nile, in one of a series of low mounds, on the site of an 
ancient city called Oxyrhynchus, whose ruins are now in part occupied 
by a squalid village of a few huts known as Behesa. It was found by 
two young men named A. S. Hunt and Bernard P. Grenfell, both grad- 
uates and Fellows of the University of Oxford, in England, whose 
researches for antiquities were conducted under the general direction of 
Professor Petrie. 

Upon the internal evidence of the document, some critics date this 
fragment as early as A. D. 140; others, by reason of its archaic expres- 
sion and characteristic framework, place it at the beginning of the second 
century. Its real antiquity as yet can not be fully determined. But if 
the latter hypothesis should prove to be the correct date, it brings the 
chronology of the document within touch of the Apostolic Age, and 
within about a half century of the publication of the Synoptic Gospels, 
and still nearer to the writing of John's Gospel. Among the seven say- 
ings of Jesus is one which does not seem to be in harmony with our 
Lord's teachings as recorded by the Evangelists. It is that which relates 
to the observance of the Sabbath. Nevertheless, in all other respects 
these Logia are of great evidential value as serving to authenticate both 
the antiquity and credibility of the Gospels, being a profane document 
from an independent source. They appear to be Memorabilia of the life 
of Jesus ; for without the historical Christ there would be no accounting 
for the origin of these " Sayings." 

It should especially be remarked that John opens both his Gospel 
and his First Epistle by designating Jesus by the Greek word Logos 
(A6yo?), which in both of our versions is rendered " Word:" "In the 
beginning was the Word;" "The Word was made [became] flesh;" 
" The Word of Life." The four Gospels do not assume to give us all the 
sayings of Christ. Indeed, John expressly disclaims doing so (Gospel, 
xxi, 25) ; and Paul makes a citation of Christ's words which are not 



674 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

found in the Gospels at all when he says : "Remember the words of the Lord 
Jesus how he said, It is more blessed to give than to receive." (Acts xx,35.) 
Scholars will be pleased to see a copy of the Greek text of this frag- 
ment so far as it has proved to be decipherable, and the translation of 
the same is herewith subjoined. The dots and brackets indicate the 
omissions which occur in the text. 

1. . . . Kal t6t€ diajSKtyeig- e/c/3a\eu> to Kapcpog- to iv ry ocpdaKp.^ tov 

d5e\<pov <rov. 
. . . ' and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote that is 
in thy brother's eye/ 

2. Aiyei 'Irjo-ouf • idv /xt] vr]<rTev<rr)Te tov Kbap.ov ov firj evprjTe ttjv fiacriXdav tov 

deov- Kal idv p.r) <raft[3aTi(rr)Te to adfifiaTov ovk decade tov Traripa. 
' Jesus saith, Except ye fast to the world, ye shall in no wise find the 
kingdom of God ; and except ye keep the sabbath, ye shall not 
see the Father.' 

3. A^yei 'l-qo-ovg- e[<r]T7]v iv p:i<r(p tov Kbcrp-ov, Kal iv <rapKl &<pdr)v avroi?, Kal 

evpov irdvTag- p.ed6ovrag- Kal ovdiva evpov drfQvTa iv avToi?, Kal iroveT rj 
tfsvxv P-ov iirl to?? vioif tCov avdp&irwv, 6'rt TvcpXol elcriv tt? Kapdia avTu)[ v]. 

'Jesus saith, I stood in the midst of the world, and in the flesh was 
I seen of them, and I found all men drunken, and none found I 
athirst among them, and my soul grieveth over the sons of men, 
because the are blind in their heart.' . . 

4. . T'fjv 7TT«xetai'. 

. . . ' the poverty. . . 

5. [A£y]ei ['Irjcrovg- 8ir]ov idv &o~lv [ ]e[ ...].. 6eoi Kal 

[ . . . ] tro . . . c[ ' ■'. . ] %o~tiv p.6vo? [ . . ]tw eyw eip.1 
/act' avT[ov] eyei[ p]ov tov \16ov /cd/cei evprjaei? p,€, o~yj.GOV t6 i-vKov Kayw 
iK€i elp,i. 

• Jesus saith, Wherever there are . . . and there is one . . . 
alone, I am with him. Raise the stone and there thou shalt find 
me ; cleave the wood, and there I am.' 

6. Aiyei 'Irjcrov^' ovk '4o~tiv deKTO? Trpo(pr)T7)£ iv tyj iraTpidi. avr[o]v } ovdi laTpbg 

iroiei depairda£ eig tov? yivwcrKovTa? avrbv. 
'Jesus saith, A prophet is not acceptable in his own country, neither 
doth a physician work cures upon them that know him.' 

7. Aiyei 'Ir-aovg- ttoXl? ipKodop.7]p,ivrj e7r' &Kpov [6]pov? v\prfhov Kal io-Tfjptypiivr) 

o&T€ Tre[o~]etv dvvarai oiire Kpv[(S]i}vai. 

'Jesus saith, A city built on the top of a hill and established, can 
neither fall nor be hid.' 

EXCURSUS D. 

Dldache; ob, The Teaching op the Twelve Apostles. 
This recently-discovered and famous writing was written in Hellen- 
istic Greek, as were the New Testament and the Septuagint of the Old 
Testament. It is believed to have been written in Syria or Palestine. 
The subject-matter of the manuscript was first announced in 1875, and 
in 1883 it was given to the world printed in complete form by the dis- 



Appendix. 675 



coverer, the distinguished scholar and prelate, Bryennios, then metro- 
politan of Serse, now of Nicomedia. The original writer is unknown. 
The document was found in what is known as the Jerusalem manuscript, 
in the library of Constantinople. This copy was made in A. D. 1056; 
but, in the judgment of the critics, the original was written A. D. 70-100, 
with a strong probability of 70-79. In 1884, Hilgenfeld issued his Novum 
Testamentum along with this manuscript, with critical emendations 
(Leipsic, iv, 94-103 ). 

The Didache bears a twofold title. The briefer one is the Teaching, 
but a more descriptive title is The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, (Aidaxr) 
tQv 5d)8ei<a 'A7to(tt6Xwv) . The opening sentence of the document reads: 
" Teaching of the Lord by the Twelve Apostles to the Nations" (AIAAXll 
Kvpiov did t&v 5w8eKa ' A.iro<rT6\ojv to?? '^dveatv). There is no claim for in- 
spiration in this writing, or that it was a part of the Scriptures of the 
New Testament. Kather it is a summary of the apostolic teachings, 
intended to be used in the catechetical instruction of converts by the 
successors of the apostles. It is concededly identical with the work 
mentioned by Eusebius and Athanasius, and cited by Clement of Alexan- 
dria. It very much resembles the Epistle of Barnabas (not the Apostolic 
Father), with which the manuscript was connected when discovered, and 
it is of the same chronology. It contains sixteen chapters, nearly half 
of which relates to The Two Ways ; the remainder referring to rites and 
orders in the Church, and to sacred occasions and observances related 
thereto, directions about the mode of baptism, formulae respecting the 
Eucharist, words about the Lord's Day, the Christian apostles and proph- 
ets, and it enjoins also a careful watchfulness for the Second Coming of 
Christ. 

Dr. Salmon, professor in the University at Dublin, remarks: "This 
work bears every mark of a great antiquity, and it is commonly accepted 
as belonging to the beginning of the second century, if not the latter 
part of the first." (Introd. N. T. 5th ed. 1891, p. 555.) Bishop Lightfoot 
says :" The archaic simplicity of its practical suggestions . . . point 
to the first or the beginning of the second century as the date of the 
work." (Apos. Fathers, ed. 1891, p. 216.) Dr. Schaff adds: " Didache is 
no modern or ancient forgery, but has every internal evidence of great 
antiquity and genuineness." " It has the highest marks of antiquity. 
. . . There is nothing in it which could not have been written between 
A. D. 70 and 100." (Teaching of Twelve Apostles, pp. 114, 119, 122.) 

EXCUESUS E. 

The Mueatorian Canon. 

This fragment is so called from the name of its discoverer, Muratori, 
an Italian. It was originally found in Bobbio in the monastery, and 
thence was carried to Milan and placed in the Ambrosian Library ^ 
where, after being for a long time lost to sight, it was discovered. This 



676 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

copy was made about the seventh or eighth century, but the original 
was composed about the middle of the second Christian century. At 
the beginning and the end, this manuscript is considerably disfigured 
by the transcriber. It is written in Latin, but unquestionably it is a 
translation from the Greek. Nevertheless, it is a document of the high- 
est interest and importance. It is also much mutilated at the beginning 
and the ending. In its present form several of the first leaves are miss- 
ing, and the fragment begins with the last words of a sentence evidently 
taken from Mark's Gospel. It then mentions Luke's Gospel as being 
third in order, having been written by Luke the physician, the compan- 
ion of Paul. It distinctly assigns the fourth Gospel to John, who is 
expressly named as " a disciple of the Lord." 

Its authorship is unknown. Bunsen attributed it to Hegesippus, 
the earliest Church historian, whose work, except a fragment, has per- 
ished. But there is nothing in the internal evidence to determine who 
the writer was, and the assigning it to any person is merely a shrewd 
guess. 

Dr. Westcott claims for the fragment a very high authority, and 
says that its composition can not be placed much later than A. D. 170. 
He says: "The internal evidence fully confirms its claim to this high 
antiquity ; and it may be regarded on the whole as a summary of the 
opinion of the Western Church on the Canon, shortly after the middle 
of the second century." 

Acts follows the Gospels ; the thirteen Pauline Epistles are referred 
to that apostle as their author. Nine are addressed to the Churches, and 
four to individuals in the Church. Of Paul it is said that he "wrote by 
name only to seven Churches, showing thereby the unity of the general 
Church ; though he wrote twice to the Corinthians and Thessalonians 
for their correction." "He wrote at greater length first to the Corin- 
thians to forbid heretical schism ; afterwards to the Galatians to put a 
stop to circumcision; then to the Romans, according to the rule of the 
[Old Testament] Scriptures, showing at the same time that Christ was the 
foundation of them." He also mentions " an Epistle to Philemon, one 
to Titus, and two to Timothy." "First Peter, and First John and the 
Epistle of James, Second Peter, and the Epistle to the Hebrews, are all 
omitted ; but, with these exceptions, every book in our New Testament 
Canon is acknowledged." (Westcott, Canon, pp. 212, 217-219,) 

EXCURSUS F. 

The Expurgated Editions of the Jewish Talmud. 

In A. D. 1240 a conference was held at Paris between the Jewish 
Rabbins on the one part, and Nicolaus Don in on the other, in regard to 
certain blasphemies and opprobrious epithets recorded against Jesus of 
Nazareth and his mother, Mary the Virgin. These things had long been 
taught to the Jewish youth. The chief of the Rabbins, whose name was 



Appendix. 677 



Jechiel, would not admit that the Jesus there referred to was the " Jesus 
of Nazareth," but affirmed that the opprobrious language of the Talmud 
then existing was meant to apply to another bearing the same name ! 
This discovery was the more remarkable inasmuch as the Rabbi could 
not designate the " other "Jesus as the distinguished personage. Dr. 
Levin, himself a Jew, in a prize essay remarks: " We must regard the at- 
tempt of F. Jechiel to ascertain that there were two by the name of Jesus as 
unfortunate, original as the idea may be!" However, the result of this 
conference was, that " the Talmud in wagon-loads was burned at Paris 
in A. D. 1242." These highly offensive passages were thereupon expunged 
from the Talmud, the last unexpur gated edition dating at Amsterdam in 1645. 
The expurgation was done under an edict published by the Jewish elders 
in Council, convened in Poland in 1631, or A. M. 5391. 

The Edict. 

" Great peace to our beloved brethren of the House of Israel : Hav- 
ing received information that many Christians have applied themselves 
with care to acquire the knowledge of the language in which our books 
were written, we therefore enjoin upon you, under the penalty of the Great 
Ban (to be inflicted upon such of you as shall transgress this our statute), 
that you do not in any new editions of the Mishna or Gemara publish 
anything relative to Jesus of Nazareth; and you take special care not to 
write anything concerning him, good or bad ; so that neither ourselves 
nor our religion be exposed to any injury. For we know what those men 
of Belial, the Murim [i. e., "Heretics"], have done to us when they be- 
came Christians, and how their representatives against us have obtained 
credit. Therefore let us make you cautious. 

"If you should not pay strict attention to this our letter, but act 
contrary thereto, and continue to publish our books in the same way as be- 
fore, you will occasion both to us and yourselves greater afflictions than 
we have hitherto experienced, and be the means of our being compelled 
to embrace the Christian religion as we were formerly ; and thus our 
latter troubles be worse than the former. For these reasons we com- 
mand you that if you publish any new editions of these books, let the 
places relating to Jesus the Nazarene be left blank, and fill the space 
with a circle like this: O. But the Rabbins and teachers of the chil- 
dren well know how to instruct the youth by the word of mouth. Then 
Christians will no longer have anything to show against us upon this 
subject, and we may expect deliverance from the afflictions we have 
heretofore labored under, and reasonably hope to live in peace." (See 
C. Leslie's Short and Easy Method with the Jews, p. 2, et seq., London, 1812, 
in which the Hebrew and the English translation appear side by side ; 
also McClintock and Strong's Cyclop, x, 172; also Rabbi Joseph S. C. F. 
Frey's Messiahship of Jesus, 1850, pp. 123, 124 ; also his Joseph and Benja- 
min, 9th ed., Vol. I, p. 238.) 

In the unexpurgated editions of the Talmud the name of Jesus oc- 
curs about twenty times. Besides being named Jesus, he is often covertly 



678 Historical Evidence of the JSTew Testament. 

referred to in terms of disguise, and in a manner marked with malignity 
illustrative of the ancient spirit which crucified him. Among those 
opprobrious epithets are the designation " A bsalom;" " Ben Stada," i. e., 
the son of Stada; " Ben Pandira, i. e., either scourge or ravenous lust, 
meaning the son of adultery; "A certain one," , '}v)D=6 5e?va, li He whom 
we may not name;" " The Nazarene;" " The Fool;" " The Hung" upon 
the cross, — cf. Acts v, 30, and x, 39. Hence Abn Ezra remarks, 
under Gen. xxvii, 39, that Constantine the Great, the first Christian 
emperor, "placed the figure of The Hung" upon his standard; and 
Rabbi Bechal, on Psalms lxxx, 14, says: "Behold and visit this vine, 
adding that in the word 1 #»p, the Hebrew letter y is suspended to indi- 
cate that those who ruin the vineyard [the Christians] are the worshipers 
of The Hung." But more and worse than this is the substituting 
Hebrew letters for the Greek form of Christ's name (BW for 'lyo-ov?, 
Jesus), from which they construct a word taking each letter as an 
initial, the several words composing a sentence to this effect: " May his 
■memory (]) be destroyed C), and his name (W) be blotted out (1)." (See 
Farrar's Life of Christ, Vol. II, 452, 453.) 

"The name was *8F [Jesus] in order that it might sound peculiar to 
the people, so as to cause them to spy out his words and deeds, and to 
search out his progenitor. Thus it would become known that he was re- 
garded as illegitimate by the Jewish sages who had bestowed upon him 
the name Jeshu designedly; because the three letters of which it is 
composed (Yomokh, Shema, Vazikho) means: "May his name be de- 
famed and obliterated !" (Toledoth Jeshu Ha Nassri.) 

EXCURSUS G. 

Extracts from the Toledoth Jeshu. 

[These extracts are taken from S. Baring-Gould's work bearing the 

title, The Lost and Hostile Gospels (London, 1874), embodying Wagen- 

seil's refutation of the original book called the Toledoth Jeshu (" History 

of Jesus"), issued in A. D. 1681, and Huldrich's translation of the same 

under the title, Historia Jeshuse Nazareni (Leyden, 1705). The original 

Toledoth Jeshu was translated years ago into English by a London Jew, 

a bookseller, under the title, The Gospel According to the Jews, in the 

stupid supposition that the book would make against Christianity !] 

1. Mother of Jesus. " In the Year of the World 4671, in the days of 

King Jannseus, a great misfortune befell Israel. There arose at 

that time a scapegrace, a wastrel and worthless fellow, of the 

fallen race of Judah, named Joseph Pandira. He was a well-built 

man, strong and handsome, but he spent his time in robbery and 

violence. His dwelling was at Bethlehem, in Juda. And there 

lived near him a widow and her daughter, whose name was Mirjam 

[Mary] ; and this is the same Mirjam who dressed and curled 

women's hair, who is mentioned several times in the Talmud." 



Appendix. 679 



This author dates the birth of Jesus, according to the Talmud, 
in the reign of Alexander Jannseus, who reigned 106-79 B. C. 
Beckoning by Jewish count from the creation of the world, he 
names the year 4671 (910 B. 0.). In opprobrious terms he repre- 
sents our Lord as the illegitimate child of this Pandira and Mary, 
whose name was Joshua, after his uncle, and was given to Rabbi 
Elchanan to be instructed in the law ; that this Jeshu (Jesus) , 
when a boy, for not uncovering his head and bowing his knee in 
the presence of some Sanhedrists, was expelled from the Temple 
under a blast of three hundred trumpets, and went to Galilee, 
where he spent several years ! Mary is represented as being a 
marvelously beautiful woman, whose death is thus mentioned: 

" Not long after this, King Herod died, and was succeeded by 
his son in the kingdom of Israel. But when he had obtained the 
throne, he heard that the people of Ai had made images in honor 
of Jesus and Mary, and he wrote letters to Ai and ordered their 
destruction. . . . When the people of Ai saw that there was 
no help, they burned the images and bound themselves before the 
sons of Israel. And about this time Mirjam, the mother of Jeshu 
died. Then the king ordered that she should be buried at the foot 
of the tree on which Jeshu had hung ; and there he also had the 
brothers and sisters of Jeshu hung up. And they were hung, and 
a memorial stone was set up on the spot. But the worthless men, 
their kinsmen, came and destroyed the memorial stone, and set 
up another in its stead, on which they wrote the words : ' Lo ! this 
is the ladder set upon the earth, whose head reaches to heaven, and 
the angels of God ascend and descend upon it, and the mother re- 
joices here in her children. Allelujah !' Now, when the king heard 
this, he destroyed the memorial they had erected, and killed a 
hundred of the kindred of Jeshu." 

2. Birth of Christ. The text of Huldrich relates that Jesus spent many 
years in Egypt, the headquarters of those who practiced the art of 
magic; that having learned the art, he went to Galilee, proclaim- 
ing himself the Creator of the world, born of a virgin according 
to the prediction of Isaiah vii, 14 ; and was ready to prove his mis- 
sion to the people by working miracles. On another occasion, 
when the Jews sought to slay Jesus, — 

"The Fatherless One answered: 'Did not Isaiah prophesy of 
me? And my father David, did he not speak of me? The Lord 
said unto me, Thou art my son; this day have I begotten thee. 
Desire of me, and I will give thee the heathen for thine inherit- 
ance, and the uttermost part of the earth for thy possession. 
Thou shalt rule them with a rod of iron, and break them in pieces 
like a potter's vessel.' And in like manner he speaks in another 
place : ' The Lord said unto my Lord : Sit thou on my right hand, 
till I make thine enemies a my footstool ! And now, behold ! I will 



680 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

ascend to my heavenly Father, and sit me down at his right 
hand.' " "About this time Jeshu assembled the inhabitants about 
him and wrought many miracles, . . . and cried: 'I am 
God, the son of God, born of my mother by the power of the Holy 
Ghost, and sprang from her virginal brow.' " 

3. Flight into Egypt. According to the Wagenseil text, Mirjam, or 

Mary, was betrothed to one Jochanan, and resided at Bethlehem ; 
in the Huldrich text, she was married to Joseph Pandira, and 
lived in Jerusalem. She was of the tribe of Benjamin! After 
many years, the home of Mirjam and Joseph Pandira, in Bethle- 
hem, became known to Herod, who sent orders for their arrest 
and for the massacre of the children ; but Joseph who had been 
forewarned by a kinsman in the court of Herod, fled with his 
wife and children into Egypt. The story relates further that after 
many years, because of a famine in Egypt, Joseph and Mirjam 
with Jeshu and his brethren returned to Canaan and resided in 
Nazareth. 

4. Jesus wrought Miracles. According to Huldrich 5 s text, our J^ord 

learned magic in Egypt, and practiced it as miracles in Judaea; 
but according to the text of Wagenseil, the following was the 
origin of Christ's miraculous power : 

" Now at this time the unutterable Name of God [i. e.> fliiTI 
Jehovah] was engraved in the Temple on the corner-stone. For 
when King David dug the foundations, he found there a stone 
in the ground on which the Name of God was engraved, and took 
it and placed it in the Holy of Holies. But as the wise men 
feared lest some inquisitive youth should learn this Name, and be 
able thereby to destroy the world — which God advert! — they 
made by magic two brazen lions, which they set before the 
entrance of the Holy of Holies, one on the right, the other on the 
left. Now, if any one were to go in, and learn the Holy Name, 
then the lions would begin to roar as he came out, so that out of 
alarm and bewilderment, he would lose his presence of mind, and 
forget the Name. 

"And Jeshu left Upper Galilee, and came secretly to Jerusa- 
lem, and went into the temple, and there learned the holy writ- 
ing; and after he had written the incommunicable Name on 
parchment, he uttered it with the intent that he might feel no pain, 
and then cut into his flesh, and hid the parchment with the in- 
scription therein. Then he uttered the Name once more, and 
made so that his flesh healed up again. And when he went to the 
door the lions roared, and he forgot the Name. Therefore he 
hastened outside the town, cut into his flesh, took'the writing out, 
and when he had sufficiently studied the signs, he retained the 
Name in his memory." 



Appendix. 681 



The Huldrich text teaches that Jesus learned magic in Egypt 
which in Palestine he palmed off as miracles. In WagenseiPs 
edition he surreptitiously obtained and wrought miracles by 
using the sacred Name of Jehovah, which could be spoken only 
by the high priest once a year, on the great Day of Atonement. The 
story in the Jew's Talmud says that he obtained miraculous power 
by bringing out of Egypt, secretly cut on the skin, the magical 
arts there privately taught ! Such silly absurdities refute them- 
selves. The story proceeds to say that Jesus said : 

" 'Bring me here a dead man, and I will restore him to life.' 
Then all the people hastened and dug into a grave, but found 
nothing in it but bones. . . . He said : ' Bring them hither to 
me.' So when they had brought them, he placed the bones to- 
gether, and surrounded them with skin and flesh and muscles, so 
that the dead man stood up alive on his feet. And when the peo- 
ple saw this, they wondered greatly. And he said : ' Do ye marvel 
at this that I have done? Bring hither a leper, and I will heal 
him.' So when they had placed a leper before him, he gave 
him health in like manner, by means of the incommunicable 
Name. And all the people that saw this fell down before him, 
prayed to him and said, ' Truly thou art the Son of God.' 

"But after five days the report of what had been done, 
came to Jerusalem, and all was related that Jeshu had wrought in 
Galilee. Then all the people rejoiced greatly ; but the elders, the 
pious men, and the company of the wise men wept bitterly. And 
the great and the little mourned, and at length agreed that they 
would send a deputation to him ; for they thought that perhaps, 
with God's help, they might overpower him and bring him to 
judgment, and condemn him to death. Therefore they sent unto 
him Ananias and Achasias, the noblest men of the little council; 
and when they had come to him, they bowed themselves before 
him reverently in order to deceive him as to their purpose. And 
he, thinking that they believed in him, received them with a 
smiling countenance, and placed them in his assembly of profli- 
gates." 

5. Jesus and His Disciples. According to Huldrich's edition of the 
Toledoth Jeshu, Jeshu gathered about him many disciples, whose 
names were " Simon and Matthias, Elikus, Mardochai, and Thoda, 
whose names Jeshu changed. He called Simon Peter, after the 
word Petrus, which in Hebrew signifies the First. And Matthias 
he called Matthew ; and Elikus he called Luke, because he sent 
him forth among the heathen [Luke x, 1-14] ; and Mardochai he 
named Mark, because he said, 'Vain men come unto me.' And 
Thoda he called Pahul [Paul], because he bore witness of him. 
Another worthless fellow also joined them, named Jochanan, and 
he changed his name to Jahannus [probably a corruption of 



682 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

Johanan, i. e., John], on account of the miracles Jeshu wrought 
through him, by means of the incommunicable Name. This 
Jahannus advised that all the men who were together should 
have their heads washed with the water Boleth, that the hair 
might not grow on them, and all the world might know that they 
were Nazarenes. But the affair was known to the elders and to 
the king. Then he sent his messengers to take Jeshu and his dis- 
ciples, to bring them to Jerusalem. But out of fear of the people, 
they gave timely warning to Jeshu that the king sought to take 
and kill him and his companions. Therefore they fled into the 
desert of Ai [Capernaum?! (Luke xiii, 31-33.) And when the 
servants of the king came and found them not, with the excep- 
tion of Jahannus, they took him and led him before the king. 
And the king ordered that Jahannus should be executed with the 
sword. The servants of the king therefore went at his com- 
mand and slew Jahannus, and hung up his head at the gate of Je- 
rusalem." [Here is an obvious confounding of John the Baptist 
with John the disciple. 1 

" There grew to be a strife between the Nazarenes and the 
Jews, . . . and the distress grew greater during thirty years. 
And the Nazarenes assembled in thousands and tens of thousands. 
And the belief of the opposition grew more and more, and spread 
on all sides. Also twelve godless runagates separated and trav- 
ersed the twelve realms, and everywhere in the assemblies of the 
people uttered false prophecies. Also many Israelites adhered to 
them ; and these were men of high renown, and they strengthened 
the faith in Jeshu. And because they gave themselves out to be 
messengers of him who was hung [in crucifixion], a great number 
followed them from among the Israelites. 

" Now when the wise men saw the desperate condition of af- 
fairs, one said to another: 'Woe unto us! for we have deserved 
it through our sins. ; And they sat in great distress, and wept, 
and looked up to heaven and prayed. And when they had ended 
their prayer, there rose up a very aged man of the elders, by name 
Simon Cephas [John i, 42], who understood prophecy; and he said 
to the others ' Hearken to me, my brethren ! if ye will consent 
unto my advice, I will separate these wicked ones from the com- 
pany of the Israelites, that they will have neither part nor lot 
with Israel. But the sin do ye take upon you.' Then answered 
they all and said, ' The sin be on us ; declare unto us thy coun- 
sel and fulfill thy purpose/ Therefore Simon son of Cephas, 
went into the Holiest Place and wrote the incommunicable Name, 
and cut into his flesh and hid the parchment therein. And when 
he came forth out of the temple he took forth the writing ; and 
when he had learned the Name, he betook himself to the chief 
city of the Nazarenes, and cried with a loud voice: 'Let all who 
believe in Jeshu come unto me, for I am sent by him to you !' 



Appendix. 683 



Then there came unto him multitudes as the sand on the seashore, 
and they said to him: ' Show us a sign that thou art sent!' And 
he said : ' What sign ?' They answered him : : Even the signs 
that Jeshu wrought when he was alive.' " [Thereupon Simon 
Peter heals a leper, and restores a dead man to life. Then the 
people adhered to him as having been sent by Jeshu. This seems 
to be a confounding of Peter with Simon Magus, mentioned in 
Acts viii, 9-24.1 

"Then said Simon Cephas to them: 'Yea, verily Jeshu did 
send me to you, and now swear unto me that ye will obey me in all 
things that I command.' And they all swore to him: 'We will 
do all things that thou commandest.' Then said Simon Cephas: 
Ye know that he who was hung [upon the cross 1 was an enemy to 
the Israelites and the Law, because of the prophecy of Isaiah 
[i, 14], Your new moons and festivals my soul hateth. And that 
he had no pleasure in the Israelites, according to the saying of 
Hosea[i,91, Ye are not my people. Now, although it is in my power 
to blot them in the twinkling of an eye from off the face of the 
earth, yet will he not root them out, but will keep them ever in 
the midst of you as a witness of his stoning and hanging on a 
tree. He endured those pains and the punishment of death, to 
redeem your souls from hell. And now he warns and commands 
you to do no harm to the Jew. Yea, even should a Jew say to a 
Nazarene, Go with me a mile, he shall go with him twain; or 
should a Nazarene be smitten by a Jew on one cheek, let him turn 
to him the other also [Matt, v, 39; Luke vi, 29], that the Jews 
may enjoy their good things ; for in the world to come they must 
suffer their punishment in hell. If ye do these things then shall 
ye merit to sit with them [the apostles] on the thrones [Matt. 
xix, 28].' 

11 Then Simon said: ' I am Simon Ben Kalpus, uncle of Jeshu. 
Jeshu came and sent me unto you to teach you his law, for he is 
the Son of God. And lo ! I will give you the law of Jesus, which 
is a new commandment.' Then he wrought before them signs and 
wonders. He also wrote books in the names of the disciples of 
Jeshu, and especially in that of Johannes [John], and said that 
Jeshu had given him these. But with special purpose he composed 
the Book of Johannes [Apocalypse or Revelation], for the men of 
Ai thought it contained mysteries, whereas it contained pure in- 
vention. For instance, he wrote in the Book of Johannes that 
Johannes saw a beast with seven heads and seven horns and seven 
crowns ; and the name of the beast was Blasphemy, and the num- 
ber of the beast was 666. [Rev. xii, 3; xiii, 1.] 

" When, now, the elders and wise men heard of what was done, 
they came to the king and consulted him and his council. Then 
answered Judas, son of Zachar: 'I am the first of the king's 
princes; I will go myself and see if it be true what is said, that 



684 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

this man blasphemeth.' After that Judas went to Jerusalem. 
. . . Now, when Judas was come to Jerusalem, he related to the 
king and the elders the words and deeds of Jeshu, and how, 
through the power of the incommunicable Name, he had wrought 
such wonders that the people of Ai believed on him. Then the 
king and the elders asked counsel of Judas how they might take 
Jeshu and his disciples." 

6. Conspiracy of Judas. "Therefore, the wise men went forth with sad 

hearts, and one turned to another and said : ' Let us use subtlety, 
that we may get him into our hands.' And one said to another: 
'If it seems right unto you, let one of us learn the Name as he 
[Jeshu] did, and work miracles, and perchance we shall secure 
him.' And this counsel pleased the elders ; and they said : ' He who 
will learn the Name, and secure the Fatherless One, shall receive 
a double reward in the future life.' And thereupon one of the 
elders stood up, whose name was Judas, and he spake unto them 
saying: 'Are ye agreed to take upon you the blame of such action, 
if I speak the incommunicable Name ? For if so, I will learn it, 
and it may happen that God in his mercy may bring the Fatherless 
One into my power.' Then they all cried out with one voice : ' The 
guilt be onus ; but do thou make the effort and succeed.' There- 
upon he went into the Holiest Place, and did what Jeshu had 
done." [Afterwards Judas is represented as working miracles by 
the use of the incommunicable Name, and in contest with Jeshu, 
Judas overcomes him, and the power of Jeshu leaves him, and he 
was subjected to the taunts of his captors, the elders.] "Now 
when the disciples saw this, and all the multitude of sinners who 
had followed him, they fought against the elders and the wise men 
of Jerusalem, and gave Jeshu opportunity to escape out of the 
city. And he hasted to the Jordan ; and when he had washed 
therein, his power returned, and with the Name, he again wrought 
his former miracles. Thereafter he went and took two millstones 
and made them swim on the water ; and he seated himself thereon, 
and caught fishes to feed the multitude that followed him." 

7. The Royal March. [At length Jesus is invited by the deputation from 

Jerusalem headed by Ananias and Achasias, by deceit and treach- 
ery, to come to that city.] "And Jeshu said, I will go forthwith 
on my way ! And it came to pass when he had come as far as Nob, 
nigh unto Jerusalem [a city near and in sight of Jerusalem, in the 
territory of Benjamin, by which the Assyrians approached the 
city mentioned in Isa. x, 28-32], that he said to his followers: 
1 Have ye here a good and comely ass ?' They answered him that 
there was one even at hand. Therefore he said : ' Bring him hither 
to me.' And so a stately ass was brought unto him, and he sat 
upon it and rode into Jerusalem. And as Jeshu entered into the 
city, all the people went forth to meet him. Then he cried saying : 



Appendix. 685 



' Of me did the prophet Zacharias testify, Behold thy King cometh 
unto thee, righteous and a Savior, poor and riding on an ass, and a 
colt the foal of an ass/ [Compare Matt, xxi, 1-11 ; Mark xi, 1-11 ; 
Luke xix, 29-40; John xii, 12-16.] Now when they heard this, 
they all wept bitterly and rent their clothes. ,, 

8. Arrest of Jesus. [Judas forewarns the elders of the Sanhedrin of 

Christ's coming to Jerusalem, and on arriving and entering the 
temple, he is attacked by armed men. Judas is identified as one of 
the disciples of Jeshu; but the Jewish servants do not know him 
from being a disciple ; so Judas casts himself down before Jeshu, 
and thus indicates to the armed men whom they are to capture. 
Some disciples offer resistance, but are readily overcome, and be- 
take themselves to the mountains, where they are caught and 
killed.] 

"But the elders of Jerusalem led Jeshu in chains into the 
city, and bound him to a marble pillar, and scourged him [Matt, 
xxvii, 26 ; John xix, 1], and said : ' Where are now all the miracles 
thou hast wrought V And they plaited a crown of thorns, and set 
it on his head." " But when the feast of the Passover drew nigh, 
it was heralded through all the land of Judaea that any one who 
had aught to say in favor, and for the exculpation of Jeshu, should 
declare it before the king." 

9. Sentence of Jesus. "Then they led Jeshu forth before the Greater 

and the Less Sanhedrin, and he was sentenced to be stoned, and 
then to be hung on a tree." " Therefore, on the eve of the Pass- 
over, Jeshu was brought out of the prison ; and they cried before 
him : ' So may all thine enemies perish, Lord !' " "And it was on 
the eve of the Passover* and of the Sabbath." 
10. Crucifixion of Jesus. " And they led him forth to the place where the 
punishment of stoning was wont to be executed, and they stoned 
him there till he was dead. And after that the wise men hung 
him on the tree ; but no tree would bear him ; each brake and 
yielded." "And they hanged him on a tree outside of Jerusalem, 
as the king and elders of Jerusalem had commanded. And all 
Israel looked on and glorified God." 

*The Jewish Talmud, which is the hasis of these two writings, states: " The 
tradition is, that on the eve of the Passover, Jesus, . . . the son of Mary, was 
hanged " [on a cross. Comp. Acts v, 30-33, and x, 39]. {Babylonian Talmud, Tract 
Sanhedrin, fol. 43a.) Again, "No defense could be found; therefore they 
hanged him upon the eve of the Passover." {Bab. Tal. Tract. Sanhedr. fol. 67a.) 
And again, "But I say his mother was Stada; and they hanged him up on the 
eve of the Passover." {Bab. Tal. Sanhedr. 67a.) 

Thus the Jewish Talmud confesses to the following facts, viz.: 

1. That the Person executed was no other than "Jesus:" " The tradition is that Je- 

sus, . . . the son of Mary." 

2. That Jesus was put to death by crucifixion: " That Jesus was hanged up." 

8. That his crucifixion occurred at a known date : " They hanged him up on the eve 
of the Passover." 
44 



686 Historical Evidence of the JS"ew Testament. 

ll.Incidents of the Crucifixion. "Then the Fatherless was in anguish 
through thirst, and he cried, saying: 'Give me water to drink!' 
[John xix, 28.] So they gave him acid vinegar [Psa. lxix, 21 ; Matt. 
xxvii, 34; John xix, 29, 30] ; and after he had drunk thereof, he 
cried : ' Of me did my father David prophesy, They gave me gall 
to eat, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.' But they 
answered : ' If thou wert God, why didst thou not know it was vin- 
egar before tasting it ? Now thou art at the brink of the grave, 
and changest not!' But Jesus wept and said: ' My God, my God ! 
why hast thou forsaken me V [Matt, xxvii, 46.] And the elders 
said: ' If thou be God, save thyself from our hands.' [Matt, xxvii, 
39-43; Mark xv, 29-32; Luke xxiii, 36, 37.] But Jesus answered, 
saying : ' My blood is shed for the redemption of the world ; for 
Isaiah prophesied of me : He was wounded for our transgressions, 
and bruised for our iniquities ; our chastisement lies upon him 
that we may have peace, and by his wounds we are healed.' [Isa. 
liii, 5.]" 

12. Burial of Jesus. "And when even was come, the wise men said: 

• We may not, on account of the Fatherless, break the letter of the 
law which forbids that one who is hung, should remain all night 
on the tree. Though he may have set at naught the law, yet 
will not we.' [John xix, 31.] Now when even was come, Judas 
took down the body of Jeshu from the tree, and laid it in his gar- 
den in a conduit." " Therefore they buried the Fatherless in the 
place where he was stoned. [John xix, 41, 42.] And when mid- 
night was come, the disciples came and seated themselves on the 
grave, and wept and lamented him. Now when Judas saw this, 
he took the body away, and buried it in his garden under a brook. 
He diverted the waters of the brook elsewhere ; but when the 
body was laid in its bed, he brought its waters back again into its 
former channel." 

13. Sis Resurrection and Ascension. "Now on the morrow, when the 

disciples had assembled and had seated themselves weeping, Judas 
came to them and said : ' Why weep ye? Seek ye him who was 
buried?' [John xx, 11-15.] And they dug and sought, and 
found him not ; and all the company cried : ' He is not in the 
grave ; he is risen and ascended into heaven ; for when he was 
alive yet, he said he would raise him up. Selah ! ' And some of 
these went to Ai, and declared that on the third day after 
Jeshu had been hung, fire had fallen from heaven, which sur- 
rounded Jeshu, and he had risen alive, and gone up to heaven." 

"Now there was among them an elder whose name was Tan- 
chuma. . . And the Kabbi Tanchuma answered [Judas] : 
' Jeshu the Fatherless is the occasion [of this new fast] ; for he 
was hung up and buried on the spot where he was stoned ; but 
now he is taken away, and we know not where he is gone. And 



Appendix. 



687 



his worthless disciples cry out that he is ascended into heaven.'" 
[Then Judas produced the body of the Fatherless from his own 
garden.] "Then the Rabbi Tanchuma hastened to the elders of 
Israel and told them all, and they came together and drew 
him [Jeshu] forth attached to the tail of a horse, and brought 
him before the queen and said : ' See, this is the man who they say 
has ascended into heaven.' " [Simon Cephas is then represented 
as saying], "And this also doth he require of you, that ye do not 
celebrate the Feast of Unleavened Bread, but that ye keep holy 
the day on which he died. And in the place of the Feast of the 
Pentecost, that ye keep the fortieth day after his stoning, on 
which he went up into heaven." 

14. Change of the Sabbath. " Therefore they arose and desecrated the 
Sabbath." "Therefore they abolished the law, and chose the 
first day of the week as the Sabbath, for that was the birthday 
of Jesus ; and they ordained many other customs and bad feasts. 
Therefore have they no part and lot in Israel. They are accursed 
in this world, and accursed in the world to come. But the Lord 
bless his people Israel with peace. These are the words of Rabbi 
Jochanan, son of Saccai in Jerusalem." 

[The foregoing extracts taken from Baring-Gould's Lost and 
Hostile Gospels, occur as follows: the First Toledoth Jeshu, on 
pages 76-101 ; the Second Toledoth Jeshu, on pages 102-115.] 

EXHIBIT A. 

The Chronology of the Books of the New Testament. 

In the first scheme following, the first four persons named are known 
as eminent Christian authors of the orthodox faith ; those following are 
recognized critics of the negative school, rationalists of views more or 
less liberal respecting the Scriptures. Their several opinions as to the 
dates when the Historical Books of the New Testament were written 
are here indicated. 



td 


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% 


b 




► 


a 




a 
















b 






b 




b 






Matt. 


60-67 


41-48 


60-63 


68-69 


66 


68 


70 


70 


70 


84 


105-115 


130 


Mark 


60-67 


63 


67-08 


68-69 ] 


00 


75 


58 


69 


81 


76 


73 


150 


Luke 


64-65 


50-58 


63 


63-67 


90 


80 


80 7( 


^80 


100 


94 


100-103 


140 


John 


80-100 


70-87 


80 


78-90 


30 


123 


120 


05 


140 


127 


150 


170 


Acts 


64 


63 




63-67 












120 







688 



Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



a) THE HISTORICAL BOOKS. 


Book 


Writer 


Place 


Addressed to 


Date 


Key Thought 


1, Synoptic Gospels: 
First Gospel 


Matt. 
Mark 
Luke 
John 

Luke 


Judaea 
Rome 

Csesarea 
Ephesus 
Rome 


Jewish Christians. 
Roman Christians 
Greek Christians . 
Christian Church . 
Gentile World 


60-65 
60-65 
58-65 
90-95 

58-67 


Jesus the true 

Messiah. 
Jesus the Son 

of man. 
Jesus the Re- 
deemer of men. 
Jesus Incarnate 

Son of God 


Second Gospel 

Third Gospel 

2. Fourth Gospel 

8. Acts of Apostles 




j8) THE PAULINE EPISTLES. 


Writings 


Place 


Addressed to 


Date 


Key Thought 


4. Earliest Epistles : 
Two in number. 

1. Thessalonians .... 

2. Thessalonians.... 

5. Epistles univer- 
sally accredited: 
Four in number. 

Galatians 


Corinth 
Corinth 

Corinth or 
Ephesus 

Macedonia 
Macedonia 
Corinth 

Csesarea or 
Rome 

Rome 
Rome 

Macedonia 

Rome 

Macedonia 

Rome 

Palestine 


Thessalonian ) 
Christians... \ 

Thessalonian ) 
Christians... \ 

Church in ) 

Galatia ) 

Church in ) 

Corinth \ 

Church in \ 

Corinth j" 

Christians at ) 

Rome S 

Church at > 
Philippi } 

Church at ) 
Ephesus | 

Church at \ 
Colosse j 

His Convert ) 
Timothy j 

His Convert \ 
Timothy \ 

Titus of Crete 

Master of \ 
Oneslmus ... j 

Jewish \ 
Christians... J 


52 
53 

56 
57 

57 
58 

58-60 
62-63 
61-63 

62-65 
65-66 
65 

65 

63,64 


\ Second Advent of 
) Jesus Christ. 
( Misapprehensions of 
I advent corrected. 

Salvation by faith. 

{ Resurrection of 

( Jesus Christ. 

/ Defense of his own 

\ apostleship. 

f Sin and the power 

\ of grace. 

f Spiritual encour- 

X agements. 

f Unity of the 

X Christians. 

j Corrections of heret- 

( ical views. 

\ Church officers and 

( their duties. 

j Apprehension of his 

X own death. 

f Persons of Churchly 

( offices. 

f Slavery or freedom 
t of Onesimus. 

( High Priesthood of 


1. Corinthians 

2. Corinthians 


6. Epistles of his 
Captivity: Three. 

Philippians 




Colossians 


7. Pastoral Epistles : 
Three. 

1. Timothy 


2. Timothy 


Titus 


8. One Personal 
Epistle: 

Philemon 


9. One General 
Epistle: 








( Jesus Christ. 



Appendix. 



689 



7) THE CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 


Writings 


Place 


Addressed to 


Date 


Key Thought 


1. James 


Jerusalem... 

Babylon 

Unknown... 


Jewish ) 

Christians... J 
The Dis- j 

persed Jews \ 
The Church j 

in general... | 
The General ) 

Church J 

To the Elect ) 

Lady \ 

Elder Be- [ 

loved Gaius J 


63-64 

64 

66 

90-95 

90-95 

90-95 


j Duties: prayer, 
\ faith, works, 
j Encouragements in 
1 Christian life. 
j The new heaven 
\ and new earth, 
j Love of Jesus and 
( the brethren. 

Loyal obedience to 
I Jesus Christ. 
\ The general state of 
\ the Church. 


2. 1 Peter 


3. 2 Peter 

4. 1 John 


5. 2 John 


Ephesus 

Ephesus 


6. 3 John 




5) BOOK OF REVELATION. 


The Apocalypse. „ 


Patmos* or 
Ephesus... 


Seven "i 
Churches of > 
Asia J 


96-98 
or 
68-69 


(*The consummation 
| of all things. 



*If the Apostle John was banished to Patmos under the reign of Nero, as the 
internal evidence indicates, he wrote the Apocalypse about A. D. 68 or 69; but the 
Gospel and Epistles were written at the later date given. This view is accepted 
by Neander, Liicke, Bleek, Ewald, DeWette, Baur, Hilgenfeld, Reuss, Diister- 
dieck, "Weiss, R6nan, Stanley, Asbe, Stuart, Davidson, Cowles, Bishop Lightfoot, 
"Westcott, and Schaff . But the older commentators and some recent ones, among 
whom are Elliott, Alford, Hengstenberg, Ebrard, Lange, Hofmann, Godet, Lee, 
etc., favor the traditional date as the external evidence indicates, which is A. D. 96, 
after Domitian's death. John is said to have died a natural death in the reign of 
Trajan about A. D. 98. (See on this Schaff, Hist. Christ Church, i, 429, note 1; 834, 
note 2 and 3.) 

EXHIBIT B. 

Table of High Priests and Eoman Procurators. 



A COMPLETE CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF THE ROMAN PROCURATORS 

OF JUDAEA. 


No. 


High Priests 


Date 


Procurators of Judaea 


Date 


1 


Annas or Ananus, son of Seth 


A. D. 

6 


Appointed by Augustus 
Coponius 


A. D. 

6-9 
9-12 
12-15 


Marcus Ambivius 


Annius Rufus 




2 
3 
4 
5 

6 


Ishmael, son of Fabus 


15 

17 
18 

34 
36 


Appointed by Tiberius 


15-26 
26-36 
36,37 


Eleazar, son of Annas 


Simon, son of Camithus 




Joseph Caiaphas, son-in-law of 
Annas 


Marcellus* or Marcus 





690 



Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 



No. 


High Priests 


Date 


Procurators op Judaea 


Date 


7 

8 




37 
41 


Appointed by Caligula 

Marullus + or Maryllius 

Publius Patronius 


37-39 
39-41 
41-44 


Simon Canthera, son of Boethus.. 


Herod Agrippa I, king 


9 
10 

11 
12 
13 

14 


Matthias, son of Annas 


42 

43 

45 
47 
47 
59 


Appointed bt Claudius 

Cuspius Fadus 

Tiberius Alexander 

Ventidius Cumanus 


44-46 
46-48 
48-52 
52-60 


Aljoneus, or Elionseus, son of 


Joseph, son of Camydus 

Ananias, son of Nebaeus 








Ishmael, son of Fabi, junior 


15 
16 
17 
18 
19 
20 




61 
62 
62 
63 
65 
67 


Appointed bt Nero 


60-62 
62-64 
64-70 

69,70 


Ananus, son of Annas 


Jesus, son of Damnseus 




Jesus, son of Gamaliel 






Marcus An tonius ) 
Julianus $ J 







♦Appointed pro tern, upon the removal of Pontius Pilate from the pro- 
curatorship in A. D.36. Publius Patronius, President of Syria governed Judsea 
39-41, when Herod Agrippa I had Judaea added to his kingdom from 41 to 44, when 
the king died, and Judsea lapsed into a province under a procurator. 

f Marullus was titled " Hipparch," or " Master of the Horse:" 'iTrir&pxov iirl 
TTJg- 'lovSaiar iKTrt/JLirei MdpvWop. (Joseph. Ant. xviii, 6, 10.) 

§ Julianus is inexactly called iwiTpoiro? for procurator by Josephus ( Wars, vi, 
4, 2) ; but probably never governed, but identified himself with the army of Titus, 
which completely obliterated the Jewish nationality in A. D.70. 

EXHIBIT 0. 

A Comparative View of the Opinions op Pre-eminent Ckitios 

Kespecting the Chronology op These Witnesses 

and Documents. 

FIRST CENTURY : A. D. 30-130. 





m 


m 


W 


f 


M 


H 


3 

CO 
Q 


r Jl 


"Witnesses 


a 

W 

3 


W3 

wo 

H H 
H Q 






3 s 


CD 

Q 

w 


> 

K 




AND 


« 


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H !> 


H 




O 


2! 


Documents. 






^2 


: « 
: tt 


r 


tr 1 

o 
M 
►a 



O 








52-632 
70 

70-100 


d.i 65 

97-98 
100 


100 


100 
100 










Paul 




Martial 


Juvenal 


Didache 






40-110 




109 












107 
120 


115-116 
98-138 


100 
b.i68 


100 
110 



















ib.=born; d.=died. 



2 Date of writing. 



Appendix. 



691 



Witnesses 

and 
Documents. 



m 

M B 
Q b 






Pliny, Jr 

Trajan 

Hadrian 

Josephus 

Talmud 

Toledoth Jeshu 
Clement (Rome) 

Barnabas 

Ignatius 

Polycarp 

Aristides 

Quadratus 

Diognetus 



109-1112 
98-1173 
117-1383 

d.il03 : 

150 

95 

97-100 
107-108 
d. 155 
117-137 
117-137 
125-150 



61-115 



Ant. 
Wars,l00 



93-101 
119-126 



d. 166 



b.161 



b. 37 



70-79 

d. 155 
123-126 
125-127 



106-107 
106-107 
117 
Wars, 75 
Ant. 93 
180 

96 

70-79 

70-107 

108 

123 

123 



95 

70-79 
100-110 
d. 155 



180-210 



117 



70-80 
117 



100-105 



70-79 
d.155 



SECOND CENTURY : A. D. 130-230. 



Aurelius 

Celsus 

Lucian j 

Galen 

Justin 

Dion Cassius.... 

Hegesippus 

Muratorian 

Canon 

Melito 

Irenseus 

Apollonius 

Clement 

(Alexandria) 
Tertullian 



161-180 
161-180 
>.120 
.200 

147-150 
155-229 
1.180 

170 
177 

177-190 
». 150 

198-211 
200 



138-161 
154-166 


b. 121 


176 
176 


165 


161-180 
150-160 




150 


176 


176 


165 






130-200 
148-165 
155-229 


137-161 
180 


180 
140 
230 
173 


140-160 


138-139 


145-146 
157-168 


177 


177 
b. 125 


177 
167 


b. 120 

b. 120 


177 
177 


170 
169 
130-220 


198-211 


192 


194 
200 






165-220 



150 

170 

170 

170 

180 

d.185* 

197* 



THIRD CENTURY : A. D. 230-330. 



Origen 

Porphyry.... 
Lactantius . 
Hierocles.... 
Eusebius ... 
Constantine 
Julian 



245-248 
290-300 
d. 330 

315 

312-337 



270 

302-329 

284-305 



361-363 3 



b.23 
304 



270 
306 
303 
315 

361 



304 



225-254 



160-240 



i b.= born, d. = died. 
2 Date of writing. 



3 Emperor's reign. 

^Opinion of Conybeare and Howson. 



692 Historical Evidence of the New Testament. 

EXHIBIT D. 

Table of Contemporaneous Witnesses. 

The design of this Exhibit is to represent the interlapping in the 
lives of contemporaries who witness to facts recorded in the New Tes- 
tament, whether friends or foes. It serves to give in one view the unity 
and continuity of their collective testimony. Each line is based upon 
the supposed or known date of the author's birth. Also the evidential 
date and value of the documents related to different times and countries 
should be carefully noted. 

B. C. 8 Seneca, 65 A. D. 
A. D. 1 Apostle John, 95-100. 
A. D. 2 Apostle Paul, 66 or 67. 
A. D. 37 Josephus, 105. 
A. D. 40 Barnabas, 126. 
A. D. 40 Epictetus, 105. 
A. D. 43 Martial, 110. 
A. D. 45 Clement of Rome, 101. 
A. D. 50 Tacitus, 117. 
A. D. 52 Trajan, 117. 
A. D. 60 Juvenal, 105. 
A. D. 60 Ignatius, 107. 
A. D. 61 Pliny Junior, 118. 
A. D. 69 Polycarp, 155. 
A. D. 123 Celsus, 188. A. D. 70 Suetonius, 130. 
A. D. 125 Irenseus, 202. A. D. 76 Hadrian, 138. 
A. D. 130 Galen, 200. A. D. 83 Aristides, 144. 

A. D. 150 Apollonius, 240. A. D. 84 Quadratus, 148. 

A. D. 150 Tertulhan,240. A. D. 105 Justin, 165. 

A. D. 150 Clement of Alex'a., 220. A. D. 105 Hegesippus, 180. 
A. D. 155. Dion Cassias, 210. A. D. 120 Melito, 188. 

A. D. 185 Origen, 254. A. D. 120 Lucian, 190. 
A. D. 239 Porphyry, 310. A. D. 121 Aurelius, 180. 
A. D. 250 Lactantius, 327. 
A. D. 255 Hierocles, 310. 
A. D. 270 Eusebius, 340. 
Mara, dating A. D. 70. A. D. 272 Constantine, 337. 
Diadache\ A. D. 70-100. A. D. 331 Julian, 363. 
Logia of the Lord, A. D. 100-150. 
Epistle to Diognetus, A. D. 125-150. 
Muratorian Canon, A. D. 170. 
Jewish Talmud, A. D. 100-150. 
Toledoth Jeshu (Hist, of Jesus), date unknown. 









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INDEX 



A. 

Page. 

Abbot, Dr. Ezra, on the Golden Age of mankind, 23 

Consensus of the books of the N. T., 627 

Abrabanel, Rabbi, on the Star of the Messiah, 74, 75 

Accompaniments of Christ's Nativity, 63-89 

Adams, Dr. Nehemiah, on Zoroaster, and the Magi of the East, . . 72 

Administrations, remarkable changes in, 385-411 

Adversaries of Christianity classified, 12 

Advocates of Christianity classified, 13 

Agabus predicts a great famine, 420,421 

Age, The Golden, of the world, 24-26, 32 

Agrippa I, Herod, king of Judaea, 481-489 

His parentage, birth and death, 481 

His surname, title and religion, 481,482 

His early relations with Caligula, 482 

Is imprisoned by Emperor Tiberius, 482 

Caligula's grandmother intercedes, 582 

Tiberius dies and Caligula succeeds, 482 

Agrippa is exalted to royalty, 482, 483 

Departs to his kingdom of Judaea, 483 

His royalty mocked in Alexandria, Egypt, 483 

Soon returns to Rome on religious mission, 483 

Caligula, insane, claims Divine honors, 483, 484 

Agrippa dissuades him from erecting his statue in the Jewish 

Temple, 483-485 

Caligula dies and Claudius succeeds, 485 

His accession largely due to Agrippa, . 485 

Claudius confirms and enlarges Agrippa's kingdom, 485 

Agrippa distressed about his eligibility to be ruler of the 

Jews, 485,486 

Is humiliated by his superior, Vibius, president of Syria, . . 486 

A coin of Agrippa's sovereignty, 486,500 

Agrippa beheads the Apostle James, 487 

Visits Csesarea to honor the Emperor, 487 

Appears in theater in amazing splendor, 487 

Is there smitten with death, 487, 488 

Accounts thereof by Luke and Josephus compared, 488, 489 

Agrippa II, Herod, son of Agrippa I, 489-493 

Distinguished from his father, in the New Testament, .... 489, 490 

695 



696 Index. 

Page. 

His youth and education at Rome, 490 

Is early appointed King of Chalcis, 490, 491 

Soon transferred to a greater kingdom, 491 

Is appointed superintendent of Jews' Temple, manager of 

their treasury, with power to remove high priests, .... 491 
Claudius dies, and Nero succeeds, who adds cities and villages 

to Agrippa's realm, 491 

Agrippa issues coin in Nero's honor, 491,500 

Visits Ceesarea, and hears Paul's defense of his faith, . . . .492,493 
In the war, joins Roman forces against his own Jewish 

subjects, 498 

Alexander the Great, brought Greek letters into Palestine, ... 24 

On meeting Jews, is amazed beholding on the High Priest's 

miter the name Jehovah, 571,573 

Offers sacrifices in the Jews' Temple, 572 

Alexamenos, a caricature of the crucified Christ, 374,375 

Alford, Dr. Henry, an epitome of, 389 

On disposition of criminals' garments, 399 

His reason for calling a tetr arch a " king," *479 

His explanation of the term New^os, * 462 

Andrew's discovery of the Messiah, 49 

Anonymous writer's conception of miracle, 119, 164 

Anticipations of Messiah, 21-39 

Chaldaic Targum, The, on his Advent, 28, 29 

Jewish Talmud, The, on Messiah's birth, 26-28 

Anticipates his Incarnation, 27-31 

Jewish People's expectations, 29-31 

Other nations looked for a Messiah, 31-33 

Messiah of Canaanites and Samaritans, 32 

Christ's own claim to Messiahship discussed, 35-39 

Antioch, in Syria, where Christ's followers were first called 

Christians, 316 

Antipas, Herod, the Tetrarch, 477^81 

His character as a man and ruler, 99, 100 

How settled over his Tetrarchy, 99,100 

Intrigue and marriage with Herodias, 100, 480 

His imprisonment of John the Baptist, 100 

Machserus, the name and place of John's prison, 102, 103 

There Antipas executes the Baptist, 103, 104 

Discussion of the Tetrarch's motives and vacillation, .... 103-105 

Exposure of his disloyalty to Caligula, 477 

Antipas is deposed, confiscated, and banished by the Emperor, 477, 478 

His tetrarchy transferred to Agrippa I, 477,478 

Antipas's relations with Jesus 477,481 

Why a mere Tetrarch is called King in the New Testament, 

279, 280, and note. 



Index. 697 

Page. 

Antiquities, as witnesses of sacred history, 12 

Apologists of Christianity explained, 12 

Apollonius, The Apologist, an epitome of, 346, 347 

On the life of primitive Christians, 356, 357 

The just an offense to the unjust, 368 

Apostles of Jesus, and their Work, 315-342 

On the historical existence of the Apostles of Jesus Christ, . 318 

The four lists recorded in the New Testament, 322 

First called Christians at Antioch, 316, * 349 

Talmud on the Apostles' names, 319 

Toledoth Jeshu on the number, mission, and success of the 

Apostles, 319 

Celsus on their number, and character, 319 

Julian on the success of the Apostles' mission, 319 

Testimony of Barnabas, Aristides, Tertullian, and Paul on 

Christian success, . - 319,320 

Analysis of the foregoing testimony, 320,321 

James, the Lord's brother, becomes also an Apostle, .... 321,322 

When he became converted to the faith, 322 

Pre-eminence of James among the Jews, 323, 324 

Pre-eminence of James among Christians, 322-324 

Review and inductions, 326, 327 

Christ's Apostles wrought many Miracles, 328-333 

Miracles in demand by their work, 328,329 

Their miracles were all wrought in Christ's name, 329 

How adversaries explained miracles, 330-332 

Origen's witness on the continuance of miracles in his time, 332 

Review of testimony on the Apostles' miracles, 332, 333 

Apostles' Mission and Ministry to the Nations, 333-342 

The testimony of disbelievers on the success of Christianity, 333, 334 

Confirmed by Christian writers, 334-336 

Christianity and the Roman Empire, 336-342 

Edicts of Constantine the Great, 336, 337 

The apostolic success as recorded in the New Testament, . . 337-341 

State Church as organized under Constantine, 336,337 

Obstacles which opposed the Christian religion, 340, 341 

The final triumph of Christianity, 337-339 

Apostles' Creed, summarizes the facts of the Faith, 310 

Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (Didache), 674,675 

Apostolic Fathers, the appellation explained, 12, 214, 278 

Appeals to the reigning Csesar : Agrippa appeals against Antipas, • 477, 478 

Philo and company appeal to Rome, 452 

Suetonius on appeals to the Emperor, 576 

Pliny on Christian appeals, 576, 671 

Paul appeals from Festus to Caesar, 447, 448 

Appendix of this work, 663-694 



698 Index. 

Page. 

Appian, on Koman citizenship, 444 

Archaeology (see Bennett's Christian Art), on Christian Baptism, 109, 110 

Archelaus, Herod, the Ethnarch, 472-475 

Is denied royalty by Augustus, 472 

Made Ethnarch over half of Judaea, 472 

Usurps kingly authority at once, . .472,473 

Is extremely cruel towards his subjects, 473 

Is finally deposed, confiscated, and banished, 473 

Gospel's brief notice of Archelaus, 474 

Criticism on the Gospel's exactness, 474, 475, 479, 480 

Aretas, King of Arabia. On his Kingship over Damascus, . . . 455, 559 

Testimony of Josephus, Oonybeare and Howson, 560 

Coins of Aretas in existence, 560,561 

Weiseler's explanation of the coins, . . . 561 

Eckhel's explanation of the situation, 560, 561 

Aristides, Marcianus, an epitome of, .' 116,216 

On Christ as the source of Christian Religion, 124, 230 

On the identity of the spoken and written Gospel, 304 

Jesus pierced, died and was buried, 304 

After three days he rose and ascended, 304 

The Apostles then went forth preaching, 304 

The Apostolic Creed partly cited, 305 

The practical life of early Christians, 355, 356 

Arnold, Matthew, an epitome of, 237 

On the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 239 

Arnold, Thomas, an epitome of, 347 

His criticism of Gibbon on the Christian persecutions, . . . 377 

Arrian, on feigned Roman citizenship, 445 

Ascension of Jesus Christ, 295, 297-311 

The sayings of Christ respecting it, 299, 300 

The realization attested by evangelists, 300, 301 

The witness of Peter and Stephen, . 301, 302 

The witness of John and Paul, 306 

Testimony of Jewish adversaries, 302, 303 

Testimony of Roman adversaries, 303 

Testimony of Apostolic Fathers, 303,304 

Testimony of Christian Apologists, 304,305 

Analysis of testimonies, and inductions legitimated, .... 310, 311 

Astronomical argument on the Star of the Nativity, 74, 75 

Athanasius, on the Founder of Christianity, 316 

Athens, Paul waiting at, 567 

Athenians extremely religious, 567, 568 

The numerous statues of their gods, 568 

Introduction of strange gods was death, * 568 

On the altar of the Unknown God, 567, 569-573 

Augustus, First Emperor of Rome 413, 415-419 



Index. 699 

Page. 
His title and life, 418 

How the appellation Augustus descended to subsequent em- 
perors, 418, note, * 424 

In authority and power supreme, 416-418 

Is angry toward Herod the Great, 466 

His sarcasm on Herod's murderous conduct, 69, 467 

Augustan band explained, 573, note 79, 574 

Aurelius, Marcus Antonius, Emperor, an epitome of, 118 

His dislike of Christians and Christianity, 350,351 

B. 

Bacon, Lord, on the Bible, 503 

Balaam, on the advent of the coming Messiah, 66 

Baptism, the element and mode, 109, 110, 127, 128 

Baptist, John, his unique place in history, 91-111 

The sanctity of his life and work, 95 

Testimony of Evangelists and Josephus, 96, 97 

Chronology of John's ministry, 97 

Strauss confirms Luke's accuracy, 98 

Luke confirmed by Tacitus and Josephus, 99, 100 

Evangelists on John's offense, 100 

Josephus's confirmation of the Gospels, 100, 101 

Occasion for the Baptist's execution, 101 

Machserus the place of John's prison and death, 102, 103 

Antipas's motive for beheading John, 103 

His vacillation of purpose explained, 104, 105 

Skeptical objection to the narrative of the execution, .... 105 

John's peculiar relation to Jesus, 106, 107 

John's unique mission with his people, 108 

Confirmations by Christian writers, 108, 109 

Re -corroboration by Christian Art, 109, 110 

Review and summary, 110, 111 

Bardesanes, on the Lord's day, 132 

Barker, Joseph, on the horror of infidelity, 635 

Bar-Kokheba, the false Messiah, . 73 

Issued a coin bearing a Star, 73 

Barnabas, epitome of, 214-216 

Antiquity of his epistle, 215,216 

His testimony on the number and authority of the Apostles, 623 

On the miracles wrought by Christ, 623 

On six details of Christ's sufferings, 623, 624 

Barnabas testifies to Christ's crucifixion, 624 

To his resurrection, 624 

To the institution of the Sabbath, 624 

To the Lord's ascension, 624 

To Matthew's Gospel as then "written," 624 



700 Index. 

Page. 

Battle-ground, ancient, of Christianity, 591 

Baur, Ferdinand Christian, epitome of, 236 

On the historicity of Christ's resurrection, 279, 292 

On the disciples' faith in the resurrection, 283 

Beale, Professor, on Protoplasm and Bathybius, 198 

Bernice, a Herodian Princess, 493,495,496 

Bevan, on Roman citizenship, 445 

Beyschlag, Christian Church the offspring of a miracle, not of a lie, 292 

On Christ's resurrection, 238 

Bichart, X, on the constant changeableness of natural forces, . . 190 

Birth-place of the Messiah designated, 26, 27, 57, 58 

Biscoe, errors of classic writers on apostolic times, 456 

Talmud's explanation of Paul's scourging, 447 

Blackstone, William, on the law of Nature, and the law of Reve- 
lation, 503 

Body-guard of executed criminals, 398, 399 

Bolingbroke, an epitome of, 213 

On Isaiah's prediction of Christ's death, 217 

Books of the New Testament, 637-639 

On the art of ancient book-making, 637,638 

The materials used in the art, 637, 638 

The methods of ancient writers, 638,639 

(On the manuscripts of the Sacred Books, see Manuscripts of 
the New Testament) ; Witness of Roman adversaries to the 
existence, authors, contents and antiquity of the Books of 

the New Testament, 598-626 

Emperor Julian's witness to Sacred Books, and their contents, 596-599 

On their apostolic authorship, 597 

Hierocles attests five sacred books, 600, 601, 605 

Porphry's witness to several authors, 602, 603, 606 

Celsus constantly attributes the historical books to Christ's 

disciples, 606-611 

Justin confirms, calling them "Memoirs," 620,621 

Papias on Matthew, Mark, John and Peter, 622 

Origen on the Gospels, the Johannine and Pe trine Epistles, 

Hebrews, and Revelation, 615 

Tertullian on six Pauline Epistles, 617, 618 

Clement of Rome cites fourteen books, 622, 623 

Muratorian Canon, on the origin of John's Gospel, 616 

Confirmation by Clement of Alexandria, 617 

Irenseus, on the Gospels, 618-620 

On the authority of Matthew's "written" Gospel, 619, 620 

Barnabas on Matthew, the contents, quotations, and declara- 
tion of a "written" Gospel, 623-626 

On the Titles of the Sacred Books, 615. 5, 626, 627, 639 

On the Signatures of the Sacred Writers, 614, 615 



Index. 701 



Pagk. 
Lord Hales's citations of the New Testament taken from the 

early Fathers, 629, 630 

Citations from all the Books of the New Testament by two 
apostolic Fathers, and two Christian Apologists, for two cen- 
turies after their publication, 627-632 

Lardner, Rawlinson, and Given, on citations from New Testa- 
ment, compared with those from classic writings, as evidence 

of historicity, 627-631 

How Sacred Books were properly preserved, * 618 

How transmitted, identified, and accepted as apostolic, . . . 620 
How the Sacred Books were first burned by the Roman gov- 
ernment, 600, 656 

Canon of the Sacred Books, how formed, 649-661 

(See Council of Trent), 657,658 

Brewer, Justice David J. , on the satisfactions and comforts of the 

Bible, 635 

Bruce, on Christian miracles, 185 

Bunsen, on the date of Barnabas's Epistle, 215 

Burial of criminals' dead bodies, 399 

O. 

Caligula and Herod Agrippa I, 482-485 

Were educated together at Rome, 481, 482 

Became mu tally and warmly attached, 482 

Caligula becomes Emperor, 482 

His character as Emperor, 419^ 420 

He demanded divine honors to himself, 419, 483, 484 

As characterized by Edward Gibbon, 365 

Caludius, on the Star of the Messiah, 72 

Canaanite cognizes the Messiah in Christ, 32 

Canon of the Books of the New Testament, 649-660 

The term Canon explained, 649 

The Canon and the Church Councils, . 650 

History of the Sacred Canon of the New Testament, 652-660 

Discussion by Salmon and Westcott, 653, 654 

William Hone, on the Canon of the New Testament, .... 651, 652 

Caricature of the Crucified Christ, 374, 375 

Tertullian on a Roman caricature, 375 

Carpenter, Dr. W. B., epitome of, 183,184 

On the source of all power in mind, 200 

Science, man's conception of the order of the universe, . . . 188, 191 

Rejects Huxley's doctrine of Bathybius, 198 

Cassidorus, on Quirinius's enrollments, 82 

Cassius, Dion, epitome of, 94 

Great famine in Italy, 523, 524 

On the execution of Lollia Paulina, 105 

45 



702 Index. 

Page. 
A slave bearing a tablet with a written accusation thereon, . 398 

Jews' superstition for the walls of the Temple, 535, 536 

Catalogues, eleven, of the Books of the New Testament, .... 656, 657 

Carlyle on Atheism and the Creator, 197 

Caesars, The, five in number/ 413,415-425 

Csesarea Philippi, the capital of Herod Agrippa II, 491 

Celsus, epitome of, 388 

On the Messiah, foretold and honored, 35 

The Nativity of Jesus, 54, 56, 58, 59, 61, 69 

On the Magi (Wise Men) of the East, 73 

Slaying of children of Bethlehem, 69 

On the flight of Jesus to Egypt, 68, 69 

Concedes the fact of Christ's baptism, 107 

On the ministry of our Lord, 121-123 

He ascribes miracles to Jesus Christ, 151 

Incidents of Christ's passion, . ' . 219 

His agony in Gethsemane, 219, 220 

His betrayal by Judas Iscariot, 220, 319 

The mock-royalty to taunt Jesus, 220 

Scourging inflicted on Christ's person, 220, 224 

Incidents connected with Christ's death, 222 

The crucifixion of Jesus Christ, 224 

His reception of proffered vinegar, 223 

The Jews punished for offering him gall, 223 

On the outcry of Jesus to the Father, . 225 

The veritable death of Jesus, 224, 267 

On the blood which followed the spear, 225 

Earthquake and preternatural darkness, 225 

On the descent of Christ into Hades, 226 

The Son of God sent to save the Jews, 125, 126, 220 

Christ the object of supreme worship, 125, 224, 373, 374 

The resurrection of Jesus Christ, 267 

Christ suffered in behalf of mankind, 125, 220 

On Jesus as the God-hating sorcerer, 151, 152 

Savior the Son of the greatest God, 125 

On the disciples of Christ, 319 

The inspiration of the Apostles, 221 

Sacred books ascribed to Christ's disciples, 606-611 

On Celsus's knowledge of the New Testament, 388, 389 

He persecutes the Christians, 361 

His mistakes about the Magi and the Herods, * 69, 392 

Census or registration, 403 

Centurion, 403, note 46 

Christ (see Jesus Christ.) 

Christ, the Historical, 113, 115-125 

His unique ministry inaugurated, 120-124 



Index. 703 

Pagb. 

His activities as Leader, Teacher, and Preacher, 121-123 

Christ the Founder of Christianity, 123-125, 224, 228, 229 

Christianity, The Ancient, 125 

Its ancient doctrines, 125 

As attested by adversaries, 125-127 

The Institutions of, 125-127 

Baptism, as teaching of the Apostles, 127, 128 

The Lord's Supper or the Eucharist, 128, 129 

The Lord's-day, 130-134 

Council of Nicaea on the Lord's-day, • 130 

Constantine and other Christian authorities, 130-134 

Christianity of Christ, 134-137 

The atonement made by Christ, 125, 126 

The resurrection of the human body, 126 

The immortality of the human spirit, 126 

The general judgment of mankind, 126 

The final punishment of the incorrigible, 126, 127 

Christian Era, the, and Dionysius Exiguus, 76, 77, 593, 594 

Christians escape at the siege of Jerusalem, * 528-530 

Christian persecutions, 343, 345-383 

Christlieb, Theodore, epitome of, 164 

On the miraculous foundation of Gospel history, 170 

Christ himself the central miracle of history, 172 

Place of miracles in the Christian system, « . 169-210 

On the origin of living organisms, 200 

Eeply to Strauss on explaining a miracle, 204, 205 

Criticism of Kenan's treatment of miracles, 209, 210 

His reply to Re"nan on submitting a present miracle to the 

savants of Paris, 207 

Chronology of the Books of the New Testament, 687-790 

Chronological table of Contemporary Witnesses, 693, 694 

Chronology of John the Baptist's ministry, 97 

Chronology of the Apostle John's exile to, and release from 

Patmos, 133, note 65 

Chrysostom, John, epitome of, 163 

On the evangelists' want of signatures to their Gospels, . . . 614 

Chubb, Thomas, his view of miracles, 186 

Circumstances concurrent with the Nativity of Jesus, 63, 65-89 

Joseph, and family, and Egypt, 67,68 

Children of Bethlehem slain, 68 

The fact conceded by Celsus, 69 

Testimony of the Toledoth Jeshu, 69 

Sarcastic jest by Augustus on Herod, 69 

Maccabean treaty violated by Herod, 70 

The Wise men of the East and the Star, 71 

Nestorian claim about Zoroaster and the Star of Bethlehem, 72 



704 Index. 

Page. 

Testimony of Caludius, a philosopher, 72 

The Jewish Talmud and the Star, 72, 73 

The Christ-impostor, Bar-Kokheba, and his star, 73 

Origen and Celsus on the Star, 73, 74 

Patristic testimony on the Star, 73, 74 

Testimony of Rabbi Abrabanel on the Star, 74 

Kepler, Schubert, Pritchard, Ideler, Pingre,andEncke, on this 

astronomical phenomenon, 75 

Edersheim, Wieseler, and Schaff, on the Star of Bethlehem, 75 

The death of king Herod the Great, 76 

The enrollments under Quirinius, 77, 78 

The Roman enrollment, but Jewish method, 78, 79 

The researches of Augustus W. Zumpt, 79, 80 

Cassidorus, Suidas, and others on the enrollment of the 

Nativity, 82 

Confirmation by Josephus, Julian, Justin, Tertullian, and 

Clement of Alexandria, 81,85 

Reconfirmed by a monumental slab bearing an inscription, . 86, 87 

Summary of this evidence, 87-89 

Cicero, on Roman citizenship, 442-443 

Citizenship, Roman, 441 

How acquired and restricted, 444, 445 

The rights conferred by law, 441-443 

Sometimes conferred by sheer caprice, 443 

The Jews eligible conditionally, 444, 445 

How deprived and annulled, 443, 444 

Citizens exempt from torture by law, 442, 446 

Feigned citizenship severely punished, 445 

Citizenship of Paul, 446-449 

Why did he not claim his rights from scourging, 446-448 

How the order was given to scourge, 446 

Claudius, the Emperor, epitome of, 413,420 

His character as an Emperor, 365, 417, 420 

He banished Christian Jews from Rome, 363, 422, 423 

Clay, Henry, his regard for Christianity, 635 

Clement of Alexandria (born about 160, died about 215), on the 

first enrollment at the Nativity, 85 

On Peter preaching publicly at Rome, 619 

Mark's Gospel composed from Peter's preaching , 619, 620 

On the origin of John's Gospel, 616, 617 

On John the Baptist, 108 

Clement of Rome, epitome of, 116,235 

On the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 269 

Coins of the Herods, 500, 501 

Coin of Aretas, 560, 561 

Coleridge on miracles and Revelation, 164 



Index. 705 

Page. 

On vipers on the island Malta, 578 

Comparative table of witnesses, 690 

Compte", on the subjection of the intellect of man to a law of 

necessity, 192 

Huxley's repudiation of the doctrine, 192 

Conspectus of this work, 9 

Constantine, the Great, epitome of, 118,8 

His imperial edicts favorable to Christianity, 336, 337 

His inauguration of the State Church, 336 

Converts to Christianity called Christians, 316, 317 

Conybeare and Howson, on Tarsus as a free city, 444 

The Aretas dynasty and Damascus, 560 

On the Politarchs of Asia, 565, 566 

The identity of the island Melita (Malta) , 577, 578 

Coponius, procurator of Judaea, replaces Archelaus the Ethnarch, 473 

Is invested with the power of life and death, 473 

Council of Nicsea, 130 

Council of Trent, 657,658 

Critics, on the chronology of witnesses and documents, 690,691 

Criteria of Testimonies, 15 

Custody proper for the Sacred Documents, 16, * 618 

Cyprian, Bishop, on the Lord's-day, 131,279 

D. 

Damascus, and Paul's escape from Aretas, 559 

Dana, Professor James D., on Science and the Book of God, . . . 503 

Dates comparative of critics' opinions, 690, 691 

Davies, G. S., on the numerous statues to the gods at Athens, . . 568, 569 
Didache, or teaching of the Apostles, 119 

On Christian Baptism, 127, 128 

Diocletian, Emperor, on persecutions of the Christians, . . . 366, 367, 372 

Burial of dead bodies of criminals, 398, 399 

Diognetus, on the Epistle to, 346 

On Christian persecutions, 367 

Dion Cassius see Cassius). 

Dionysius Exiguus (see Exiguus), 76,77,594 

Divergent testimonies, Canon of, 15 

Domitian, the Emperor, arrogates to himself the title Lord, . . . 452 

Drusilla, a Herodian princess, wife of Felix, 496,497,500 

Dry den, lines on Christian persecutions, 382 

DuBoise,Eaymond, on bridging the living, and not-living, . . . 199 

E. 

Ebrard, on how seeming discrepancies arise, * 258 

Eckhel, on exchange of Damascus and Petra, 560 

Eclipse of the moon at Herod's death, 76 



706 Index. 

Page. 

Edersheim, epitome of, 66 

On the Advent of the Messiah, 67 

Christ's life began and ended with a miracle, 237 

On the Nativity and the Chinese astronomical tables, .... 75 

On the method of Jewish enrollments, 79 

"kxkrjv and 'EXXi/wctiJs in distinction in the New Testament, . . . *508 

Emperors, Roman, 413, 418-425 

Their function and power, 417, and i 

Some assumed the title of the Deity, 419, 420 

Several characterized by Gibbon, 365 

Encke, on the Star of the Nativity, 75,88 

Enrollments made by Quirinius, 77-89, 400 

Luke's statement thereon, 77 

Two different enrollments effected, . . 80 

Both are mentioned by the Evangelist, 81 

Cassidorus and Suidas on enrollments, 82 

Silence of Josephus, as evidence, 82,83 

Testimony of Julian (Emperor), 84 

Testimony of Justin, Clement of Alexandria, and Tertullian, 85 

Monumental evidence of, 86, 87 

Epictetus, epitome of, 347 

His opinion of the Christians, 349 

Ephesus, city in Asia Minor, 561,562 

Visited by Paul, 561 

Era, Christian, reckoned by Dionysius Exiguus, . 76,77,594 

Escape of the Christians from the siege of Jerusalem, 528-530 

Josephus on this escape, . .528,529,530 

Dr. Philip Schaff on this event, 528, 529 

Eusebius on its occurrence, 529 

Epiphanius, makes mention of it, 529, 530 

Eusebius, the first Christian historian, epitome of, 93 

On the Holy Quaternion of the Gospels, 95 

On John the Baptist, 95-111 

On James the Just, the Lord's brother, 315 

On the Lord's day, 131 

Time in Christ's life covered by John's Gospel, 96, 97 

The Lord's brother first Bishop of Jerusalem, 324 

After Paul's appeal, Jews turned upon James the Just in 

persecution, 324, 325 

Pilate reported Christ's resurrection to the Emperor Tiberius, * 426 
Tiberius proposed to the Senate Christ to be a deity of the 

empire, 522 

Great famine prevailed over the world, 523 

Apostles' exodus from the siege, Jerusalem, 528,529 

Christ predicts Jerusalem's destruction, 519 

Evidences, documentary and monumental, 4,5 



Index. 707 



Page. 
Historical evidences, characteristics of, 13, 14 

Evidential value of the Gospels, 409-411 

Criteria of testimonies, 15 

Value of added witnesses, . 14, 15 

Custody of ancient documents, 16 

Mere opinions not historical evidence, 53 

Ewald, epitome of, 236 

On the Apostles and Christ's resurrection, 237,283,291 

Exchange of territory between Emperor and Senate, . . 416, 417, 455, 560 

Excursus, A-G, 663, 665-694 

A. Josephus's testimony of Jesus, 665-671 

B. Pliny's State paper to Trajan, 671,672 

C. Logia of our Lord (Christ's sayings), 673,674 

D. DidachS, or teaching of the Apostles, 674,675 

E. The Muratorian Canon, 675, 676 

F. Expurgated Talmud of the Jews, 676-678 

G. Toledoth Jeshu (History of Jesus), 678-687 

Exhibits, A-E, 663, 687-694 

A. Chronology of Books of the New Testament, 687-689 

B. High Priests and Procurators, 689, 690 

C. Critics' Chronology of Witnesses and Ancient Documents, 690, 691 

D. Contemporary Witnesses, 692 

E. Universal Chronological table, 693,694 

Exiguus, Dionysius, on the Christian Era, 76,77,594 

F. 

Family of David, Messianic fulfillment, 25, 26 

Famine, great, predicted by Agabus, 420-422 

Farrar, on the passion of Jesus Christ, 217 

Machserus, the Baptist's prison, 103 

On scourging of Paul, a Roman citizen, 447 

The character of procurator Felix, 497 

The kingship of the Tetrarch Antipas, *479 

The coin of the line of Aretas, , 561 

Felix, procurator of Judaea, 436,437 

His character by Tacitus, . * 437, 438, 497,498 

As given according to Josephus, 438,439 

According to Thomas Lewin, 438 

According to Farrar, 497 

Evidence of procuratorship from coins, 438 

His marriage with Drusilla, 496, 497 

Paul's address to Felix justified, 438,439 

Felix arrested and sent to Rome, 450 

Festus, succeeds Felix as procurator of Judaea, 450 

Josephus on the succession, 450 

The character of Festus, 449, 450 



708 Index. 

Page. 

His use of the title " my Lord/' 450,451 

Fisher, Professor George P., epitome of, 143,144 

On the advancement and power of the Christian Religion, . . 557 

Christ and the destruction of Jerusalem, 545, 546 

First day of the week (see Lord's-day), 130 

Fortitude of the Christians persecuted, 558, 559 

Franklin, Benjamin, on Paine's Age of Reason, 635 

Frey, Rabbi, traditional Address of Magi to Herod, 71 

Disposition of Christ's body after death, 227 

Fronto on the expression " My Lord," 452 

G. 

Galen, epitome of, 348 

His opinion of Christian firmness, 351 

Gallio, proconsul of Achaia, 452 

Refuses charge against Paul, 452, 454, 457 

Garments of executed criminals, . 399 

Genealogy of the Herodian family, 500 

Geography, Historical, of the New Testament, 557, 558, 559 

Paul at Damascus, 559 

Paul at Ephesus, 561 

Paul at Philippi, 562 

Paul at Thessalonica, 565 

Paul at Athens, 567 

PaulatMelita (Malta), 576-580 

Paul at Puteoli (Puzzuoli), 580,581 

Paul at Rome, 581-584 

Gibbon, Edward, the historian, epitome of, 213,214 

On preternatural darkness at Christ's death, 226 

Confirms Tacitus and Suetonius on the persecutions of the 

Christians, 229, 362, 363 

Justifies early Christians against their persecutors, . . . 370, 376, 377 
Criticised by Thomas Arnold, and by Lecky as destitute of all 

sympathy for the persecuted, 377, 378 

On the inalienable rights of conscience, 353 

Christians rejected the gods of Rome, 348 

Holy places polluted by monuments of idolatry, 540 

Gibbon's characterization of some early Emperors, 365 

Given, Professor J. J., comparison of sacred and classic books for 

authenticity, and citations, 629, 631 

Lord Hales on citations of early Fathers from the New 

Testament, 629, 630 

Golden Age, 23-26,32 

Gospels, the special objects of Evangelists, in writing them, . . . 50-52 
Government, remarkable changes in the first fifty years of our 

era, 406-408 



Index. 709 

Page. 

Goethe, epitome of, 587,588 

His emphasis upon the Gospels of Christ, 589 

Grsetz, Heinrich, a Jewish historian, 225 

His testimony on Christ's miracles, 151 

Apostles went forth executing miracles, 332 

Jews tempt Judas to betray Jesus, 225 

On the exact time of the Crucifixion, 225 

The inscription on the cross, 225 

Christ's outcry to the Father, 225 

On the place of Christ's burial, 225 

The terrible results following to the Jews, 225 

Confesses the founding of Christianity, 225 

Granianus, Serenius, his protest against Christian persecution, . 366 

Rescript of Hadrian on persecution, 366 

Grant, U. S., on the Bible, 635 

Greek and Grecians distinguished in the New Testament, .... * 508 

Greenleaf on the custody of ancient documents, 16, * 618 

Griesbach, on prolusion, 257,258 

Grove, W. R., on causation and creation, 200 

Guizot, Professor, on the Bible and its triumphs, 557 

H. 

Hackel, Professor, on the origin of life, 199 

On the existence of Moneron, 198 

Haddarshan, Rabbi Moses, on the Resurrection of the Messiah, . 269 

Hadrian, Emperor, his rescript on the persecutions, 366 

Hakkodesh, Rabbi Judah, on the Resurrection of the Messiah, . 269 
Hales, Lord, on citations from the New Testament, on early 

Fathers, 629, 630 

Hamann, John G., epitome of, 163 

A miracle required to believe a miracle, 164 

Hausrath, characterization of Herod Antipas, . . . 477 

Hegesippus, the historian, on the Lord's brother, James the Just, 323-325 

Herod the Great, king, 462-472 

Born of Idumsean stock, 463 

How he became procurator, 463, 464 

How he acquired royalty, 464 

His character as a ruler, 462-464, 76 

His conduct in his own family, 466,467 

His disposition toward Christ, 467, 468 

His treachery to the royalty of the Maccabees, 70 

Herodian rulers of the second generation, 472-481 

Herod Archelaus (see Archelaus), 472-477 

Herod Philip II (Herod Philip), 475^77 

Herod Antipas (see Antipas), 477-181 

Herodias, a princess of the house, 494,495 



710 Index. 

Page. 

Eloped and married An tipas, 100,480,494,495 

Her dealings with John the Baptist, 480, 495 

Herschel, on all discoveries confirming Scriptures, 503 

Hesychius, Bishop of Egypt, on accusations written on tablets, . 398 

Hierocles, epitome of, 141 

, On Christ as a magician, 144 

Concedes that he wrought miracles, 144,601 

Affirms that Christ ascended to heaven, 303 

Christians called Jesus God, 374 

His persecution of the Christians, 655 

Attests Peter and Paul as Apostles, 601 

Histories, Sacred and Secular, compared, 628,629.632 

Hodge, Dr. Charles, on miracles, 145 

Huldrich, his edition of the Toledoth Jeshu, 678-687 

On Jesus learning magic in Egypt, 680, 681 

A marriage of Mary and Joseph Pandira, 679 

On the beheading of the Baptist, . . 682 

Hume, David, epitome of, 142 

On not having read the New Testament, 635 

His position about miracles of Scripture, 146, 186 

Hume's position refuted by Huxley, 146, 147 

Miracles contrary to experience, . . . . N 202 

His prediction that Christianity will fade away in 1900, . . . 557 

Huxley, Thomas H., epitome of, 142, 143 

Refutes Hume on miracles, 146, 147 

On the absurdity of atheism, 185 

Is refuted on Bathybius, and spontaneous generation, . . . 197-199 
On evolution and the living and not-living, 199-200 

I. 

Ideler, astronomer, on the Star of the Nativity, 75 

Ignatius, epitome of, 46, 47 

On the tribe and incarnation of Jesus, 58 

Christ's passion, death and resurrection, 230,270 

On the Lord's-day as the Sabbath, 132,278 

On the Eucharist, or Lord's Supper, 128 

Incarnation of Jesus Christ, 60-62 

Institutions of Christianity, 127-134 

On the institution of Baptism, 127, 128 

On the Lord's Supper, 128 

On the Lord's-day, 130-134 

Constantine's edict on the Lord's-day, 131 

Eusebius verifies the same, 131 

Confirmations by Peter and Cyprian, 131 

Testimonies by Irenseus, Bardesenes, Justin, Ignatius, on the 
Lord's-day, 131,132 



Index. 711 

Page. 
Testimony of John, Barnabas, the Didache, and Paul, on the 
Lord's-day, 133 

Introduction of this book, . ix-xvii 

Plan of the work, ix 

The proposition, ix 

Function of witnesses, ix-xii 

Adverse witnesses classified, xii 

Advocates classified, xiii 

Characteristics of Historical Evidence, xiii, xiv 

Value of added witnesses, xiv, xv 

Criteria of testimonies, xv,xvi 

Canon of divergent testimony, xv 

Starkie on conflicting testimony, xv 

Lewis on original witnesses, xv 

Greenleaf on custody of documents, xvi 

Prospectus of the work, xvi,xvii 

Irenaeus, epitome of, 66 

On the Lord's Supper (Eucharist), 128 

On the Lord's-day ( Sabbath), 132,278 

On Christ's ascension, 304 

Written Gospels the source of Christianity, 618-620 

Adoration and gifts of the Magi, 73 

On the Star of Bethlehem, 73 

On Christ's resurrection, 278 

Christian miracles wrought in Christ's name, 158, 159 

J. 

James, the Just (the Lord's brother), 315, 321-327, 254, 255 

Josephus's reference to James, 666, 667 

Discriminated from others of that name, 321 

His place in Joseph's family, 322 

His pre-eminence among the Jews, 323 

Not mentioned in the four lists of the Apostles, 322 

How afterward he became an Apostle, 254, 255, 322 

Became pre-eminent among Christians, 322, 323, 255 

How he became first Bishop of the Church, 255, 324 

How he was martyred by the Jews, 324-327 

Jefferson, Thomas, on Christ's system of morality, 348 

Jerome, epitome of, 217 

On an eclipse of the sun at Christ's crucifixion, 230,231 

Jerusalem, destruction of, 519-554 

Jesus Christ, anticipated as the Messiah of prophecy, 21, 23-39 

On the Nativity of Christ, 41-62 

On concurrent circumstances, 63-89 

The Christ of History, 113, 115-125 

His unique ministry, • * . . 120-123 



712 Index. 

Page. 

Was the Founder of Christianity, 123-125, 134-137 

Proof of miracles which Christ wrought, 139, 141-160 

A definition of a miracle, 145, 146, 189 

Christ's miracles witnessed by his disciples, 147 

Never denied for centuries, , 148 

Attested by Jewish authorities, . . 149-151 

Conceded by Eoman philosophers, 151-155 

Heathen explanations of Christ's miracles, 156 

Testimony of Christian writers, 158, 159 

Miracles true and false, 152-154 

The Christianity of Christ, . 134-137 

(For Christ's passion, death, and burial, see 213-232 

For the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, see 233-293 

For Christ's ascension to heaven, see 295-311 

For characteristics and value of his miracles, see .... 161, 163-179 
For modern objections to miracles, see 181, 183-210.) 

Jewish Literature of the Messiah, 26-31 

The Talmud on Messiah's birth, 26, 27 

On the incarnation of Messiah, 27, 28 

Chaldaic Targums on Messiah, . . 28,29 

Jewish people and their Messiah, 29-31 

Persecutions of the Christians, 343, 359-361 

Implacable hate for Christ's people, 360 

Prayers for curses on the Gentiles, 360, 361 

Jewish Nation, in times of the New Testament, 501, 503-554 

Jews' condition in the period of Christ, 504 

Sanhedrin, how organized, , 505, 506 

Its functions and place of sitting, 506 

Rise of sectional differences and services, .......... 507-509 

4 * The Dispersed " put to disadvantage, 509-512 

On different sects among the Jews, 512,513 

Spirit of insubordination and conspiracy, 515-518 

Destruction of the Jewish nationality, 518-554 

Christ's predictions and their fulfillment, 518-546 

The beginning of sorrows, 523 

The signs of warning, 526 

To be accomplished in that generation, . . . 530 

Cessation of sacrifices forever, 534, 535 

The Temple at Jerusalem burned to ashes, 535 

The predicted conquest completed, 538, 543 

The captives and their treatment, 541,542 

Why visited on that generation, 543, 544 

Christ and this terrible situation, 545, 546 

The Roman conquest and triumph, 546, 547 

The Arch of Vespasian and Titus at Rome, 547, 548 



Index. 713 

The prediction, realization, and advantages to the Christian 

world, 549-554 

John, the Lord's Apostle, 52, 133, 616-619 

His release from Patmos, 133 note 

How John's Gospel originated, 616,617,619 

Confirmed by Clement of Alexandria, 617 

Its authorship identified by Irenseus, 616 

Attested by other Apostles, present, 616 

Special object in writing his Gospel, 52,617 

John's witness to Christ's resurrection and ascension, .... 306 

His testimony on the Lord's own day, 133 

Irenseus on the death of John, 619 

John, the Baptist (see under Baptist, John), 91,93-111 

Joseph's family and Egypt, 67, 68 

Josephus, epitome of, 387, 388 

On the expected Messiah, 34, 38, 39 

His testimony of Jesus Christ, 613, 665-671 

On the success of his ministry, 318, 665 

On James, the brother of Jesus, ... 315, 324, 325 

Character of John the Baptist, 97 

His imprisonment and death, 100-103 

Occasion of John's execution, 101 

Confirms Luke on Theudas and Judas, 83,84 

On Herod's sons and their territories, 99, 100, 406-408 

Marriage of Antipas and Herodias, 100 

Aretas's quarrel with Antipas, 100 

Florus on scourging and crucifying Jews, 396, 397 

The great famine in Judsea, 420-422 

Coponius appointed procurator, 473 

Jews lived under their own laws, 395 

Idumaeans and the unburied dead, 399 

Caligula claims to be a deity, 419,451 

Orders his statue in Jews' Temple, 419, 420 

Is dissuaded by Agrippa I, 420, 483, 484 

Claudius controlled by his freedmen, 420 

Gratus and Pilate made procurators, 428, 429 

Pilate transfers his army to Jerusalem, 429 

Pilate's cruelty and vacillation, 432,433 

The traveling tribunal of Philip II, 430 

Pilate appropriates the sacred Corban, 434 

He orders the slaughter of the Jews, 434 

He also massacres many of the Samaritans, 434 

Felix appointed as procurator, 438 

Felix and an Egyptian impostor, 439, 440 

Festus succeeds Felix as procurator, 450 



714 Index. 

Page. 

Herod's father once procurator, 463, 464 

The Herods were of Idumsean stock, 463 

The time of Herod's procuratorship, 463 

Governed conjointly with his brother, 464 

Herod usurped the power of death, 506 

Parthians invade Herod's territory, 464 

Herod flees to Rome for help, 464 

Caesar crowns Herod king of Palestine, 464 

He restores the Temple at Jerusalem, 465 

Kebuilds the Temple of the Samaritans, . 466 

Builds a monument over royal tombs, 466 

Herod the Great married nine wives, 467 

He executes his favorite wife, Mariamne, 467 

And her grandfather Hyrcanus, 467 

He also slays three of his own sons, 467 

Proposes to massacre his own nobles, 467 

Augustus is angry with Herod the Great, 466 

Had allowed him to appoint his sons his successors, ..... 470 

Simon usurped his kingship at Herod's death, 471, 475 

Josephus designates Antipas a tetrarch, 470, 476 

How Herod Archelaus became ethnarch, 471 

The localities in Philip's tetrarchy, 471 

The localities in Antipas's tetrarchy, 471 

Archelaus mentioned as eldest brother, 472 

Augustus denied him a kingdom, 472, 475 

But he usurped kingly prerogatives, 472 

Archelaus slew thousands of subjects, 473 

Soon he was deposed and banished, 473 

His ethnarchy became a Roman province, 473 

Coponius was made procurator over Judsea, 394, 473 

Power over life and death given Coponius, 473 

Quirinius registers the Jews' property, . 473 

Quadratus sends Ananus to Rome in chains, 576 

Julius made Antipater a citizen of Rome, 445 

Jews refuse to call any man Lord, 451 

Jews discourage learning foreign languages, 509 

The dispersion of Jews in all lands, 511 

Antipas builds the city of Tiberias, 474 

The parentage of Herod Philip II, 475 

Salome was his wife and niece, 475 

Philip builds Csesarea-Philippi for his capital, 476 

The death and burial of Philip II, 476 

Antipas, the youngest of three brothers, 477 

Is appointed tetrarch over Galilee and Persea, 477 

The character of Herod Antipas, 477 

Proves disloyal to Emperor Caligula, 477 



Index. 715 



Page. 

Is deposed and perpetually exiled, 477,478 

Had eloped and married his brother's wife, 480 

Antipas's behavior with Jesus, 480, 481 

Parentage and marriage of Agrippa I, 481 

He is styled Agrippa the Great, 481, 482 

He was a zealous Jew educated at Rome, 482 

In youth was intimate with Caligula, 482 

"Was magnetic and fond of popularity, 482 

He reflected on Tiberius and was put in irons, 482, 582 

Tiberius dies and Caligula succeeds him, 482 

Caligula appoints Agrippa to royalty, 482 

Substitutes a gold chain for the iron one, 483 

Claudius succeeds Caligula, as emperor, 485 

Makes Agrippa's kingdom identical with that of Herod the 

Great, his grandfather, 485 

Agrippa I is twice humiliated by Vibius, president of Syria, 486 

King Agrippa celebrates games at Csesarea, 487 

Is arrayed in gorgeous apparel in the theater, 487 

People shout that Agrippa is a god, 488 

Nor does he rebuke the impious flattery, 488 

Agrippa I dies after five days, 489 

His son was now but a youth at Rome, 490 

Claudius makes him king of Chalcis, 491 

Fadus made procurator over the kingdom of Agrippa I, . . . 490 

Soon Agrippa II is removed to a greater kingdom, 491 

He has authority over the Temple, its treasury, and the High 

Priests, 491 

He enlarges Csesarea-Philippi in honor of Nero, 491 

Is regarded as cold-blooded and arbitrary, 491 

Makes several visits of courtesy, . .492,493,496 

Respecting Bernice, this Agrippa's sister, 495, 496 

Respecting Drusilla, sister of Agrippa II, 496, 497 

Origin of the sect called Sadducees, 512 

On the sect of Jews called Pharisees, 513 

On enmity between Jews and Samaritans, 514 

Samaritans excluded from the Temple, 515 

The two impostors, Theudas and Judas, 516 

A conspiracy to kill Herod the Great, 517 

Josephus arraigns some Jews as criminals, 518 

Procurators deal with impostors and robbers, 520, 521 

On earthquakes and pestilence, - . 524 

Greeks and Syrians slay many Jews, 525 

Many instances of thousands of Jews slain, 525, 526 

Cumanus deposed and banished, 525 

Roman soldier insults Jews at Passover, 526 

Pilate and Roman eagles in Jerusalem, 527 



716 Index. 

Page. 

Herod's golden eagle and the Temple, 527 

Vitellius marched around the Jews' land, 527 

Cestius withdraws army from his siege of Jerusalem, .... 528 

Many inhabitants now escape the siege, 529, 530 

Titus raises banks against Jerusalem, 532 

The Eoman army constructs walls, 532 

The calamities of famine and deaths, 532,533 

Dead bodies thrown down before the walls, 533 

Date when the Jewish-Roman war began, 534 

When sacrificing at the Temple ceased forever, 534 

Titus resolves to storm the Temple, 535 

Battering-rams fail at certain points, 535 

The Temple burned to its foundation, 535 

Massive walls were leveled, 538,539 

The city reduced to shapeless ruins, 536, 540 

Romans bring in " the abomination of desolation," 537 

They sacrificed to their gods in the Temple courts, 537 

Titus attributes the conquest to God, .537,538 

The former city contrasted with its ruins, 536, 540 

Captives, their wives and children sold to be slaves, 542 

Estimates of numbers lost in this war, 541-543 

Vitellius held a grudge against Antipas, 559 

Damascenes and the bribery of Agrippa I, 560 

Moses offering prayers in open air, 563 

Alexander meeting the High Priest 571,572 

Syrian's appreciation of Cesarean soldiers, 574 

Varus sends a captain to the Emperor, 576 

Felix sent noted robbers to Csesar, 576 

Vitellius sent Pilate also to Rome, 576 

Josephus ship- wrecked, reached Puteoli, 581 

Both Antipas and Fortunatu sailed to Puteoli, 581 

Julian, Emperor, epitome of, 43, 44 

Affirms Jesus was a subject of Csesar, 54 

That he was enrolled by Quirinius, 54 

That Christ's relatives did not believe on Jesus, 54 

That Christ had been celebrated 300 years, 54 

That Christians claimed Jesus was begotten by the Holy 

Ghost, 54 

That the genealogy derives him from Judah, ........ 54 

That Matthew and Luke differ in genealogy, 54 

That Christians believed Jesus born of a Virgin, 55 

They continually call Mary, mother of God, 55 

On the birth and incarnation of Jesus, 596, 597 

On the books of the New Testament, 597-599 

On the miracles of Jesus Christ, 155, 599, 600 

Names the authors of the four Gospels, 597 



Index. 717 

Page. 

Mentions also Peter and Paul, 597 

Also citations from Matthew and Luke, 598 

Cites from Pauline Epistles, 598, 599 

His disparagement of early Christians, 596 

His opinion of the Christian religion, 351,354 

His ridicule of Christian Baptism, 127 

He persecutes Christians for their religion, 354,357 

On the Apostles' success in preaching, 319 

Admits the conversion of Cornelius, and of Sergius Paulus, . 319 

Julius, the Centurion, Paul placed in his charge to sail, .... 573 
The cohort of soldiers under him, 573, 574 

Justin Martyr, theApologist, an epitome of, 65, 66 

On the Magi, or Wise Men of the East, 74 

The enrollment of Quirinius, 85 

Prophecy of John until Jesus came, 108 

The Christians were called Atheists, 353 

The place of Jesus in the Trinity, 353 

The practice of the Lord's Supper, 128 

The practice on the Lord's-day, 132 

The resurrection and ascension of Christ, 305 

The Jews' persecution of Christians, 367 

Pilate's official report of Christ's resurrection, to the Emperor, *426 
His reproof of Jews for sending abroad false reports about 

Christ and Christianity, * 243 

On Jews cursing the Christians in their synagogues, .... 367 

Juvenal, the Roman poet, an epitome of, 345 

On punishments inflicted on criminals, 376 

The Jews' place of worship at Rome, 563 

K. 

Kant, creation inexplicable by matter alone, 200 

Keim, Dr. Theodore, epitome of, 236,237 

On the resurrection of Christ, 271, 272 

Denial, not due to scientific or religious conscience, 328, 329 

Keim's criticism of the vision theory of Christ's resurrection, 290, 291 
The exalted and reticent originality of Christ's sayings, . . . 589 

Paul on the resurrection, 271, 272, 290, 291 

Kepler, his astronomical argument on the Star of the Nativity, . 75 

Koslin, on a faith without signs and wonders, 178 

L. 

Lactantius, epitome of, 216, 217 

On absurdity of forcing conscience, 348 

Lange, on Herod and the Messianic Prophet, 70 

Lardner, Dr. Nathaniel, an eminent critic, epitome of, 49,5 

On the authenticity of the New Testament Scriptures, . . . 628 
46 



718 Index. 

Page. 

Lecky, on Christ as an ideal character, 120 

Critics' unexamining incredulity, 185 

Christ, the enduring principle of regeneration, 124 

Gibbon's want of sympathy with martyrs, 377, 378 

Legate, Quirinius, his functions of office, 425 

Lewin, Thomas, on the coins of Aretas, 560 

The Jews proseuchge, . . 564 

Magistrates on monuments, not in books, 566 

Death for disturbing religion of the State, 568 * 

Felix and Festus procurators of Judsea, 438 

The Neokoros of Thessalonica, the authoritative Speaker of 

Senate and Assembly, 562 

Paul at the Philippian proseucha, 564 

On Alexander, and the Book of Daniel, . 572 

Intimacy of Jews and Greeks, 572,573 

On the Primate of the Maltese, 578 

On viper, and bundles of wood at Malta, 579 

Lewis, Sir George C, on credibility of original witnesses, . . . . 15,461 

Liebig, the eminent scientist, epitome of, 183 

Denies life existing from eternity, 200 

Life, its origin unaccountable says Hackel, 199 

DuBoise, on the living, and the not-living, 199 

Huxley, on evolution and origin of life, 199 

Thomson that life proceeds from life, 200 

Kant, matter alone can not explain life, 200 

Tyndall, life only from antecedent life, 200 

Liebig, once organic life did not exist, 200 

Schenkel, harmony not annihilated by a creative God, .... 200 

Grove, creation is the act of God, 200 

Christlieb, life on earth has not always existed, 200 

Cuvier, it is easy to indicate when life on earth began, . . . 200 

Lightfoot, on the Rabbis, and the Greek language, 509 

Lincoln, Abraham, the Bible the best gift of God to man, .... 635 

Livy, epitome of, 389 

On scourging and crucifixion, 396 

Locke, John, on the miracles of Jesus Christ, 164 

Logia, or the sayings of Jesus Christ, 673, 674 

Longfellow, lines on the word of the Lord, 635 

Lord's-day, by whom instituted, 130-134, 278, 279 

Lucan, on the Unknown God, 570,571 

Lucian, epitome of, 115, 604, 605 

On Christ's introduction of Christianity, 123 

Christians' worship of Christ, 605 

Their disregard for temporal things, 605 

Their belief in their own immortality, 361,605 

Their tender offices for each other, 355, 605 



Index. 719 

Pa&e. 

Lucian's disrespectful reference to Paul, 605 

On freedom given to the city Tarsus, 444 

Summary of Lucian's testimony, . 606 

Luke's special object in writing a Gospel, 51 

Christ's followers first called Christians, 315 

Luther, Martin, on the Council of Trent, 658 

Lyell, Sir Charles, epitome of, 183 

On atavism among descendants, 190, 191 

Lyndhurst, Lord, on the resurrection of Christ, 239 

M. 

Machserus, prison of John the Baptist, 102, 103 

Maclear, on indirect historical allusions in the New Testament, . 389 

Changes in government first fifty years, 461 

Archaeological discoveries and sacred history, 415 

Macrobius, Augustus's sarcasm on Herod the Great, 69 

Magi, or Wise Men, and the Star of the Nativity, 71,72 

Malta (island Melita), and the ship-wreck of the Apostle Paul, . 576-580 

Manuscripts of the New Testament, 636-646 

On many books in one, 636 

The ancient art of book-making, 637 

The ancient penmen employed, 638 

The materials used for writing, 637, 638 

The Uncial manuscripts, characteristics, 639 

The Cursive manuscripts, characteristics, 640 

Origin and distribution of Uncials, 638,639 

Number and distribution of Cursives, 640, 641 

Supplementary manuscripts, 642 

Palimpsest manuscripts, 640 

Alexandrian manuscript, 641, 642 

Sinaitic manuscript, 643, 644 

Vatican manuscript, 642, 643 

Occasion of errors in transcriptions, 645 

Detection of impostures, 646 

Mara, an Arabic writer, on Christianity based on miracles and 

parables, 159 

The Jews and the crucified Christ, 224, 225 

Purity in life of early Christians, 355 

Mark's Gospel, its origin and characteristics, 52 

Martensen, on the ascension of Christ, 298 

Martial, epitome of, 345 

Describes the sufferings of Christ, 376 

Matthew's Gospel, special object and peculiarities of, 50, 51 

Maxwell, Chief Justice, on reading the Bible, 635 

Melito, epitome of, 297 

Incarnation, death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ, . . 305 



720 Index. 

Page. 

Memorabilia, Christ's prediction of the destruction of the Jewish 

nation, 545,546 

Messiah of Scripture, 31-39 

Anticipations of, 19, 21-39 

Realization of, 41, 43-62 

Accompaniments of his advent, 63, 65-89 

Mill, John Stuart, epitome of, 119 

On historicity of Christ, 120 

Proof of miracles legitimate, 145 

Explains the phrase, " Laws of Nature," 188 

Which can not account for their own origin, 199 

Miracles of the New Testament, 139, 141-210, 328-333 

Definition of the word " miracle,'' 145, 189, 171, 172 

Anonymous author's idea of miracle, 164 

Miracles as explained by heathen writers, . 156, 330-332, 599, 603, 604 

Miracles distinguished from Magical Arts, 166-169, 179 

On miracles true or fictitious, 152-154 

Reality of Christ's miracles, 141-160 

Wrought in the disciples' presence, 147 

Adversaries witness to his miracles, 154, 155 

Christian writers also attest, 158 

Apostles wrought miracles in Christ's name, 328-333 

They were manifold in number, 330 

Miracles wrought in later centuries, 332 

All miracles Christo-centric, 171-174 

Were evidential in character and design, 178 

Were epochal in history, 174-177 

Negation of miracles historically, 186 

Miracles not denied for centuries, 148 

Modern objections to miracles, 183-210 

Hume, on miracles as violation of natural laws, 146, 186, 202,203, 188 

Huxley's refutation of Hume, 146, 147 

Nature, and our knowledge of her laws, 190 

Nature's forces modifiable by man, 193 

Natural forces antagonistic, 194, 195 

Miracles a higher order of nature, 201 

Hume on miracles contrary to experience, 202, 203 

Miracles and Deism, Materialism, and Pantheism, 201 

Miracles as having never been investigated, 204-207 

Characteristics and value of miracles, 163-179 

Evidence of miracles reviewed, 332,333 

Missionary journeys of Paul, 555-584 

Mistakes of Roman writers on apostolic times, . . * 69 , 391-393, 406, * 498 

Monumental evidences of the New Testament : Schaff on the value 

of monumental evidence, 3,4 

Palestine itself a perpetual monument of history, 411 



Index. 721 



Pagk. 
An inscription on Nero's freeing Portugal of robbers and 

Christians, 364 

On Quirinius's enumeration of citizens at Venice, 86 

Another of Quirinius as legate and proconsul, at Tibur, Tivoli, 86, 87 
Still another of Quirinius at Rome, mentioned by Tacitus, . 87 

A monument at Ancyra, recording three enrollments, .... 87 

An inscription in Judaea, mentioned by Tertullian, 87 

An inscription of seven Politarchs, in Thessalonica, 565, 566 

Two inscriptions in Malta, dedicated to the " Primate of the 

Maltese," 578 

Arch and inscription to Vespasian, and Titus at Rome, . . . 547, 548 
Ancient coins with inscriptions: Coin of Herod the Great, 

king, 500, 501 

Coin of Archelaus, ethnarch, 66, 471, 472 

Coins of Philip II, tetrarch, 66,471,472,476,500,501 

Coin of Herod Antipas, tetrarch, 500, 501 

Coin of Agrippa I, king, 486, 500, 501 

Coin of Agrippa, II, king, 491, 500, 501 

Coin of Felix, procurator of Judgea, 438 

Coin of Cominius Proculus, proconsul of Cyprus, 454 

Coin of Sergius Paulus, proconsul of Cyprus, 454 

Coin of Diana of the Ephesians, 562 

Coin of Aretas of Damascus, 561 

Coin of Judaea conquered, 547 

Monuments in other different forms : The existing Church of 

Christ, 273-275 

The ordinance of Christian Baptism, 109, 110, 127, 128 

The ordinance of the Lord's Supper, 128-130 

The institution of the Lord's-day, 130-134, 275-279 

A Graffito in caricature of Christ crucified, 374-376 

Word-tests of the New Testament, 402-405 

Moses, prediction of happiness or punishments of the future 

Israel, 542,543 

Mozley, creation and science not contradictory, 197 

Michaelis, on origin of errors in sacred books, 645 

McClintock and Strong's Cyclopedia on Christian persecutions, . 378 

On coins of Aretas, 560 

Milman, on the accuracy of Christ's prediction of the Jews' 

sufferings, 519 

Romans polluting the sacred places, 540 

Empire armed to defend polytheism, 348 

Splendor of the Roman triumph, 546 

Muller, on formation of living organisms out of lifeless matter, 200 
Muratorian Canon, a description of, 616, 675 



722 Index. 

N. 

Page. 

Nativity of Jesus Christ, 43-89 

Nero, his infamies of life, and suicidal death, 417, 423 

Nestorians, on Zoroaster and the Magi, 72 

New/co/aor, explained, 561,* 562 

New Testament historicity verified, 585,587-632 

Newton, Sir Isaac, on the Bible, its sure authenticity, 503 

Nitzsch, Karl Immanuel, epitome of, 143 

To deny miracles as impossible, is to deny the freedom of God, 144 

Norton, Professor Andrews, epitome of, 588 

Exactness of Justin on Christ's life, 621 

Christendom and the Canon of the New Testament, .... 625 

0. 

Onkelos's Targum, on the anticipated Messiah, 29 

Oosterzee, J. J., van, epitome of, ... 184 

On denying the impossibility of miracles, 184 

On Christ's ascension to heaven, 298 

The caprice of transferring from the history of Jesus to the 

Apostles, 238 

No one has the right to deny the possibility of miracles, . . . 197 

Opinions, mere, not evidential, 37 

Those held respecting miracles, 148 

Those held for early Christians and Christianity, 349-351 

Origen, epitome of, 45, 46 

On the Nativity of Christ, 73 

On the virginity of Mary, his mother, 271 

On the resurrection of Jesus, 271 

John's baptism and the Holy Ghost, 109 

On Celsus saying Jesus was Leader of his people, 122 

That miracles were wrought in the middle of the third 

century, 158, 332 

On Celsus writing, " A true Discourse," 388 

Christ's prediction and armies at Jerusalem, 325, 326 

On the success of the Gospel to his time, 335, 336 

Transmission of the four Gospels, 614 

John's three, and Peter's two Epistles, 614, 615 

On the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, 615 

P. 

Palestine, changes of government first fifty years, 385-394 

Two civilizations in one community, . 394-405 

Two systems of law for one people, 395-402 

Changes in political geography, 405-408 

Value of these facts in the Gospels, 409-411 

Paley, on his Evidences of Christianity, 3 



Index. 723 

Page. 

Papias, epitome of, 587 

Testimony on the four Gospels, 622 

Paul, the Apostle, the great change "wrought in his life, 271,306 

On the Nativity of Jesus Christ, 58 

Testimony on his death and resurrection, 271-273 

On Christ's ascension to heaven, 306 

On the first day of the week as the Lord's-day, 133 

Paul as a Roman citizen, thrice claimed, 441,446 

Why he did not claim it when scourged, 446,447 

His appeal to Csesar at Rome, 448, 449 

His journeys to the Gentile world, 555, 557-584 

The Apostle Paul at Damascus, 559-561 

Paul at Ephesus, 561,562 

Paul at Philippi, 562-565 

Paul at Thessalonica, 565-567 

Paul at Athens, 567-573 

Paul at Caesarea, 573, 574 

Paul at Melita (Malta), 576-581 

Paul at Puteoli (Pozzuoli), 580,581 

Paul at Rome, 581-584 

Paulus, Heinrich, E. G., epitome of, 347 

On Christ's resurrection, 281 

Pausanias, on the images of Hermes extending from Athens to 

Perseus, 568 

Persecutions of the primitive Christians, 345-383 

Opprobrius opinions entertained by Epictetus, Tacitus, Pliny, 

Suetonius, Aurelius, Galen, Porphyry, and Julian, 349-353 

Occasion of this heathen prejudice, 353, 354, 361, 372-374 

That Christians were pure and blameless in character, . . . 354-357 

On persistent persecutions by the heathen, 358, 359 

And malignant persecutions by the Jews, 359, 361 

Cruelty imposed by the Sanhedrin, 359, 360 

Christians cursed in Jewish prayers to God, 360 

Ostracized in service and intercourse, 360, 361 

Denounced in Talmudic literature, 360 

Persecuted by the Romans, 361-383 

Occasion of Roman persecutions, 372-374, 379-383 

Literary persecutions by philosophers, Celsus, Lucian, 

Porphyry, and Hierocles, 361, 373, 374 

Imperial persecutions by Claudius, 422, 423, 363, note 52 

By Nero, 361-365, 368, 423, 362, note, 52 

By Trajan, (with Pliny), 365,366,369,371 

By Hadrian, 366 

By Diocletian, and Maximian, 366 367, 370, 372 

By Julian, 374,351 

Gibbon severely denounces the last five Caesars, •••.... 365 



724 Index. 

Page. 
Confirmations by Apologists, Justin Martyr, Diognetus, Ap- 

pollonius, and Tertullian, 367,368 

Review of the evidence adduced, 368-370 

The four periods of Christian persecution, 370-373 

Caricature of the crucified Christ worshiped, 374, 375 

General survey of the situation, 379-382 

Inductions from foregoing facts, . 383 

Peter's sermons reported as Mark's Gospel, 52 

Peter, Bishop of Alexandria, testimony on the Lord's-day, ... 131 

Philo, and company call Caligula, " My Lord," 452, 570 

On the Jews' praying place, . . . . > 563 

Pilate, made procurator of Judaea, 428, 429 

His character as a Roman ruler of Jews, 432-436 

His violence and vacillation to his subjects, 432 

"Why he was at Jerusalem on Jewish feast-day, 429, 430 

How Pilate's wife was at Jerusalem when Jesus was put on 

trial, 431, 432 

Her message to Pilate about Christ, . .431,432 

His tessellated pavement for purposes of judicature, 430 

His enmity and amity over Christ, . . 433-436 

Pilate reports his resurrection to the Emperor Tiberius, . 230,* 426 

Pilate is arrested and sent to Rome, 576 

Pingre, on the Star of the Nativity, 75, 76, 88 

Plato, on the just and righteous man, 218 

Pliny, epitome of, 117 

His State paper to Emperor Trajan, 671, 672 

On the Lord's Supper, 128 

Obligations assumed by early Christians, 356 

Christians' fidelity to Christ, brought death, 365,366 

On Christians as Roman citizens, 576 

Plutarch, epitome of, 389 

On punishments, 397 

Politarchs in Asia, the title of office explained, 565-567 

A monument of, in Thessalonica, 566 

Polycarp, epitome of, 235, 236 

On the resurrection of Christ, 270 

On Christ's ascension to heaven, 304 

Pompey, his conquest of the Jews' Palestine, 391, 462,535 

Pool, of British Museum, on magicians and miracles, 167 

Porphyry, epitome of, 117 

His question on universal salvation, 126 

He concedes miracles as facts, 154 

He affirms Christ's ascension, 303 

His opinion of Christians, 351 

On persecution of Christians, 374 

Pritchard, on the Star of the Magi, 75 



Index. 725 

Page 
Proconsuls, three instances mentioned in the New Testament, . . 452-458 

Proconsul, a term of office, explained, 456 

Exchange of territory between the Emperor and Roman 

Senate, 453-455 

Paul and proconsul Sergius of Cyprus, 453 

Paul and proconsul Gallio of Achaia, 454 

A coin attests Luke's exactness, 454 

Summary and inductions, 457,458 

Procurator's office explained, 426 

(For list of procurators, see Exhibit B), 689,690 

Proseucha, a place of prayer, 563-565 

Punishment of criminals, 396-398 

Roman orders to scourge, 446 

Other modes of inflicting punishments, 376 

Voice of modern historians on, 376-378 

A survey of punishment inflicted on Christians, 379 

Antagonism of the natural man, 380 

Christians exulted in sufferings, 382 

Dryden's lines in conclusion, 382 

Inductions, 383 

Q. 

Quadratus, a Christian Apologist, epitome of, 141, 142 

Attests the miracles of Christ, 159 

Quadratus, Roman president of Syria, sent Samaritans and Jews 

to Caesar, 576 

Sent Ananus, the high priest to Rome in chains, 576 

Quirinius, a Roman Legate of Syria, 425 

Charged with financial affairs in Judaea, 473 

Enrolled the population at the time of the Nativity, .... 77, 80 
Registered the Jews' property about six years afterward, . 79-89,425 

R. 

Rabbis, Jewish, on Christ's ascension, 303 

Ramsay, on Quirinius's enrollments, 78, 79 

Rawlinson, Professor George, epitome of, 589 

On present knowledge of first century, 3 

Agreement of sacred and secular history, 415 

Credibility of contemporary witnesses, 461 

Roman citizenship, how acquired, 445 

On historical geography of the New Testament, 558,559 

On the titles of the books of the New Testament, 628 

Registration (see enrollments), 77-89,400 

Renan, epitome of, 184 

On Christian miracles, 187, 205-210 

His eulogy on the crucified Christ, 124 



726 Index. 

Page. 

On the ascension of Christ, 298 

The Apostles' preaching and persecutions, 348 

Retrocession in the chronology of critics 592, 593 

Eevelation progressive in character, 25, 26 

Richter, Jean Paul, epitome of, . . . 164 

On the life of Christ and history, 136 

Roman rulers of the Jews, 413, 415-458 

Rothe, R., epitome of, 163,164 

On miracles as a mode of revelation, 164 

No stumbling-block in conceiving miracles, 184 

Rousseau, epitome of, 142 

On the death of Socrates and Christ, 119 

The absurdity of questioning miracles, 144 

The majesty of the New Testament Scriptures, 589 

Applies Plato's Just Man to Jesus Christ, 218,219 

S. 

Sabbath, the Christian (see Lord's-day) , 130-134, 275-279 

Salmon, Dr. George, Professor, epitome of, 652 

On formation of the New Testament Canon, 652,653 

Transfers of territory between Emperor and Senate, .... 455 

Sanhedrin, Jewish, on how it originated, 505,506 

Its functions and place for sessions, 506 

Its persecutions of Gentiles and Christians, 360, 361 

Schaff, Dr. Philip, epitome of, 143 

On recent discoveries and investigations, 4,5 

Gospels unparalleled by secular history, 17 

Witness of Persian Magi, and Savior, 71 

On homage paid to Mary by the Magi, 73t 

Astronomical argument on the Star of the Nativity, .... 75 

On Celsus as against deists, Strauss and Renan, 3,388 

The Lord's Supper as a sacrament and a sacrifice, . ... 129 

Christ's contemporaries' belief in his miracles, 144, 149 

On the impossibility of miracles, 194, 197 

On shifting the resurrection from fact to fiction, 287 

On Keim's confession of ignorance, or return to Apostles' 

faith in the resurrection, 289 

On James the Just, the Lord's brother, 324 

On the Diocletian persecution, 367, 655, 656 

Romans exacting worship of their gods, 373 

Tortured Christians, of both sexes, of all ages, 378 

On Christians' escape from siege of Jerusalem, 528, 529 

Work of Titus, and survival of Jewish race, 548, 549 

The awful destruction of Jewish nationality and of the the- 
ocracy, 553 



Index. 727 

Page. 
Main facts and doctrines of Christianity, in the first four 

Pauline Epistles, *592 

Josephus's testimony of Jesus Christ in every manuscript and 

version of his Antiquities, 668 

Schenkel, Daniel, epitome of, 143 

More intelligence required to believe than to reject miracles, 144 

No conflict with nature on the appearance of a creating God, 200 

On a belief in the resurrection of Christ, 291, 292 

Those disbelieving in God, believe in ghosts, 169 

Scholiast, The, on Nero's persecution, 362, note 

Scrivener, on the Vulgate version, 647 

Seneca, the philosopher and statesman, epitome of, 436 

The teacher of Emperor Nero, 423 

On Roman punishments of criminals, 376 

An awful pestilence destroys population, 524 

Sergius Paulus, proconsul of Cyprus, 453 

His own coin of office as proconsul, 454 

His successor's coin of office also, 454 

Conversion of Sergius mentioned by Emperor Julian, .... 319 

Shakespeare, William, on the comfort of believing in God, . . . 557 

Smith, Dr. William, Bible Dictionary, on Aretas and Paul, . . . 590,note 

Smith, Sir James, Admiral, on the voyage and shipwreck of Paul, 573-580 

Fair Haven, Clauda, Lasea, and Port Phenice, identified, . . 575 

All traditions disregarded in investigation, 575,576 

Identification of the place of Paul's shipwreck, at Malta, . . 577-579 

Coin of Primate of the Maltese, 578 

The harbor Puteoli (or Dicearchia), the modern Puzzuoli, at 

Naples, 580 

Spinoza, Benedict, on the negation of miracles, 186 

Stanley, Dean Arthur P., epitome of, 588,589 

On Christianity founded on Fact and Truth, 589 

Starkie, Justice Thomas, on reconciling conflicting testimonies, 15 

Story, Joseph, on the Bible, the source of religion, 503 

Strauss, David, absurdity of Christianity without Christ, .... 120 

He is the highest model of religion conceivable, 123 

Life requires a miracle for its origin, 199 

Demands explanation of working laws of miracles, 204 

Denounces the Swoon theory as impossible, 282 

Suetonius, the historian, epitome of, 388 

Christ the Leader of exiled Jews at Rome, . . 122 

Held Christianity asa" new and deceitful superstition," . . 350 
Nero burns Rome, and punishes Christians for his own crime, 362 

A criminal carried tablet with accusation, 398 

Claudius's advisers were freedmen, 420, * 437 

Provincials exiled, were barred from Rome, 422 



728 Index. 

Page. 

Augustus deprived cities of freedom, . 443 

He referred all appeals to his praetor, 448 

He abhorred the title, "Lord," as offensive, 451 

Tiberius regarded the title an affront, 451 

Transfer of Achaia and Macedonia to the Roman Senate, 454, 455, 560 
Populace assault Emperor because of famine, 524 

Suidas, the geographer, on the designation, Nazarenes and Gali- 
leans, *349 

Sulpicius Sever us, on the guilt of Nero in burning Rome, .... 363 
On Christians burned for Nero's crime, 363, 367 

Sunday (Sabbath), see Lord's-day, 130-134, 275-279 

" Supernatural Religion" an anonymous work against Christianity, 119 

T. 

Table of Contemporary Witnesses, 692 

Tacitus, the celebrated Roman historian, epitome of, 115,116 

On the advent of the expected Messiah, 34 

Christ, the founder of Christianity, put to death by Pontius 

Pilate, 99,123,428 

On Nero burning Rome, 315 

On Nero's persecution of Christians, 333, 362 

Gibbon's confirmation of Tacitus, 363 

Mentions Pilate as procurator of Judsea, 428 

Felix becomes procurator, 437 note, 438, 497, 498 

Census of Roman citizens given, 443 

Augustus rejects the title " Lord," 451 

Calamities of the times described, 526 

Failure of crops, and famine, 421,524 

Popular indignation at Claudius therefor, 421 

Nero sang " Destruction of Troy," over burning Rome, . . . 423 

Emperor and Senate exchange territory, 454, 455, 560 

One Simon seizes sovereignity over Judsea, on the death of 

Herod the Great, 471 

On the death of Herod Agrippa I, * 498 

Irresistible advance of Christianity, 522, 523 

On Titus's siege of Jerusalem, 532 

Soldiers at Csesarea called Augustani, .... 573 note, and 574 note 
Talleyrand, Cardinal, on how to found a religion successfully, . . 290 

Talmud, Jewish, epitome of, 21,22 

On Messiah's advent and character, 55 

His coming to be signalized by a Star, ' . . . . 66, 72, 78 

On the birth of the expected Messiah, 26, 27 

The incarnation of the Messiah, . • . 27-29 

Time for his birth long since passed, 57,62 

Opprobrious references to Jesus and his mother, 44, 678 



Index. 729 

Page. 

Mentions Jesus in manhood resident in Egypt, 44 

Acquired there miraculous powers, 150 

Concedes Jesus actually wrought miracles, 44 

Jesus mocked and condemned to die, 220 

Mentions he was crowned with thorns, 220 

The exact time of his crucifixion, 44, 224 

The cup of wormwood offered Jesus, 222 

On Christ's ascension to heaven, 308 

His return encompassed with clouds, 308 

Disciples of Jesus mentioned and named, 44, 319 

On miracles wrought by the Apostles, 331 

The destruction of the Jewish Temple, 44, 539, 540 

Jerusalem destroyed and Zion plowed, 539, 540 

Sanhedrin removed to Jamnia, 359 

It exacted Christian persecutions, 359-361 

Edict to expurgate references to Jesus from the Talmud, . 676, 677 
On the pre-eminence of James, the Lord's brother, 323,324 

Targum Chaldaic, epitome of, 22,23 

Messiah's advent signalized by a star, and clouds, . 22, 23, 28, 39, 308 

Teachings of the Apostles (document Didach£), epitome of, 

119, 674, 675, (Excursus D.) 

On Christian baptism of converts, 127, 128 

The Lord's-day as a Christian Sabbath, 133 

On the Lord's Supper (Eucharist), 128,129 

Offenses forbidden in apostolic teachings, 356,357 

(Opinions on the Didache by Dr. Salmon, Dr. Schaff, and 
Bishop Lightfoot), 675 

Temple of the Jews destroyed by Titus, 275, 466, 535, 552 

Tertullian, Quint. S. F., juriconsult in law and Christian Apolo- 
gist, epitome of , . . 47, 48 

On the Magi or the Wise Men of the East, 74 

Christ's ancestral tribe, the tribe of Judah, 58 

The enrollment at time of Nativity, 85 

On administration of Lord's Supper, 128 

On the institution of the Lord's-day, 131 

Jews' views of Christ and his miracles, 158 

The Jews extorted Christ's crucifixion, 230 

Refers to Pilate's report of Christ to Tiberius, *426 

For the fact, appeals to the archives of the Roman govern- 
ment then existing, 230 

Mentions the preternatural darkness, 230 

Christ's body watched by a large military guard, 270 

Resurrection of Jesus on the third day, 270 

His ascension encompassed by clouds, 305 

He had spent forty days with disciples in Galilee, 305 



730 Index. 



Page. 
Emperor Tiberius proposed Jesus to the Senate, to be a Roman 

God, 522 

His exposure of an image of a Roman God, 375 

His defense of persecuted Christians, 368 

Testimony, criteria of, 15 

Critics' comparative table of, 690 

Value of added witnesses, 14, 15 

Canon of divergent testimonies, 15 

Historical testimony, its method and characteristics, .... 13, 14 

Thomson, Sir William, on life from life only, 200 

Time, notations of, by Jews and Romans, 400,401 

Historical periods, by reigns, of rulers, 401 

Time-test ingrained in language, 403-405 

Toledoth Jeshu, epitome of, 44,45,678,679 

On lineage, tribe, and virgin mother of Jesus, 58,62,678,1 

On Bethlehem as the place of his birth, 58, 62, 678, 2 

On Herod ordering children slain, 69, 680, 3 

Jesus, Creator, atoned for men's sins, 126, 221 

How Jesus wrought miracles, 150, 680, 4 

That_ Jesus was crowned with thorns, 220 

That he was crucified and died on the eve of the Passover, 

224, 685, 8, 685, 7, and * 

Mentions vinegar given him on the cross, 222, 686, 9 

And the time Jesus was buried, 227, 686, 10 

On the disciples and his resurrection, 268, 686, 11, 681, 5 

Admits Jesus predicted his ascension, 303, 686, 11 

Gives number and vocation of disciples, 319, 681, 5 

The royal march to Jerusalem, 684, 7 

The Jews' conspiracy with Judas, 684, 6, 225 

The arrest of Jesus, 685, 8 

His death sentence given, . » 685, 9 

The crucifixion of Jesus, 685, 10 

Incidents of the crucifixion, 686, 11 

Burial of Christ's body, 686, 12 

His resurrection and ascension, 686, 13 

Institution of the Sabbath, 687, 14 

Trajan, Emperor, his Rescript to Pliny on persecution, 366 

Transfer of territory in government, 454, 455, 560, 361 

Tregelles, S. P., epitome of, 588 

On the Scripture as the Word of God, 590 

Trench, on Words, as fossil history, 403 

Triumphal arch of Vespasian and Titus, 546-548 

Tyndall, on life coming out of life, 200 

On spontaneous generation, 199 



Index. 731 

U. 

Page. 

Ulpian, on treatment of prisoners at Rome, 581,582 

Ulpianus, bodies of executed given to friends, *399 

Unique condition of Palestine for fifty years, 385, 387-411 

Unknown God, the, , 567-573 

V. 

Value of added witnesses, 14, 15 

Vergil, epitome of, 21 

On the Golden Age, 34 

On Messianic anticipation, 24, 25 

Versions of the New Testament, 647-649 

The Old Latin Version, 647 

The Syriac Version, 647 

The Peshito Version, 747 

The Cureton Version, 648 

The Harklean Version, 648 

A Syrian Gospel, 648 

The Egyptian Versions, 649 

The Memphitic Version, * 649 

The Thebaic Version, 649 

The Bashmuric Version, 649 

Virgin Mary, 26 

On her supposed worship, t73 

Volney, his exclamation on the ruins of Judsea, 540 

Verification of the Books of the New Testament, 587-632 

W. 

Watson, Dr. H. 0. M., on denial of the possibility of miracles, . 184 

That nature's operations are never varied not verifiable, . . 191 

Washington, George, impossible to govern well without God and 

the Bible, 503 

Webster, Daniel, on our country and the Bible, 503 

Gospel of Christ a divine reality, 503 

Westcott, Bishop, B. F., epitome of, 48 

On the incarnation of Jesus Christ, 49 

Christianity involves but creates no difficulties, 144 

On the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 289 

On the kingship of the tetrarch Antipas, *479 

On Celsus quoting the Gospels as unquestionable authority, 607 

On the Muratorian Canon, 616 

How Sacred Books became canonical, 653, 656 

Whately, Richard, epitome of, 237 

On how to distinguish between truth and fabrication, .... 415 

Whedon, Dr. D. D., on the kingship of Antipas, tetrarch, .... *479 



732 - Index. 

Page. 
Whiston, on Daniel's prediction fulfilled in the Roman- Jewish 

war, 534 

Wieseler, on the astronomy of the Star of the Nativity, 75 

Woolsey, T. J., on Roman citizenship, 445 

Worship of the Virgin Mary, 73+ 

Z. 

Zoroaster, and the Nestorians, on the Star and the Magi, .... 72 

Zumpt, Augustus W., researches on Quirinius's enrollments, . . 79,80 



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